Church-Governours to their rooms of Prelacy Fifthly judicial authority higher then others are capable of And sixthly exemption from being punishable with such kind of Censures as the platform of Reformation doth teach that they ought to be subject unto What the Power of Dominion is VVIthout order there is no living in publick Society because the want thereof is the mother of confusion whereupon division of necessity followeth and out of division destruction The Apostle therefore giving instruction to publike Societies requireth that all things be orderly done Order can have no place in things except it be settled amongst the persons that shall by office be conversant about them And if things and persons be ordered this doth imply that they are distinguished by degrees For order is a gradual disposition The whole world consisting of parts so many so different is by this only thing upheld he which framed them hath set them in order The very Deity it self both keepeth and requireth for ever this to be kept as a Law that wheresoever there is a coagmentation of many the lowest be knit unto the highest by that which being interjacent may cause each to cleave to the other and so all to continue one This order of things and persons in publike Societies is the work of Policie and the proper instrument thereof in every degree is power power being that hability which we have of our selves or receive from others for performance of any action If the action which we have to perform be conversant about matters of meer Religion the power of performing it is then spiritual And if that power be such as hath not any other to over-rule it we term it Dominion or Power Supream so far as the bounds thereof extend When therefore Christian Kings are said to have Spiritual Dominion or Supream Power in Ecclesiastical affairs and causes the meaning is that within their own Precincts and Territories they have an authority and power to command even in matters of Christian Religion and that there is no higher nor greater that can in those cases overcommand them where they are placed to raign as Kings But withal we must likewise note that their power is termed supremacy as being the highest not simply without exception of any thing For what man is so brain-sick as not to except in such speeches God himself the King of all Dominion Who doubteth but that the King who receiveth it must hold it of and order the Law according to that old axiom Altribuat Rex legi quod lex attribuit es potestatem And again Rex non debet esse sub homine sed sub Deo lege Thirdly whereas it is altogether without reason That Kings are judged to have by vertue of their Dominion although greater power then any yet not than all the state of those Societies conjoyned wherein such Soveraign rule is given them there is not any thing hereunto to the contrary by us affirmed no not when we grant supream Authority unto Kings because Supremacy is not otherwise intended or meant to exclude partly sorraign powers and partly the power which belongeth in several unto others contained as parts in that politick body over which those Kings have Supremacy Where the King hath power of Dominion or Supream power there no forrain State or Potentate no State or Potentate Domestical whether it consisteth of one or many can possibly have in the same affairs and causes Authority higher than the King Power of Spiritual Dominion therefore is in causes Ecclesiastical that ruling Authority which neither any forraign State not yet any part of that politick body at home wherein the same is established can lawfully over-rule It hath been declared already in general how the best established dominion is where the Law doth most rule the King the true effect whereof particularly is found as well in Ecclesiastical as Civil affairs In these the King through his Supream Power may do sundry great things himself both appertaining to Peace and War both at home and by command and by commerce with States abroad because the Law doth so much permit Sometimes on the other side The King alone hath no right to do without consent of his Lords and Commons in Parliament The King himself cannot change the nature of Pleas nor Courts no not so much as restore blood because the Law is a hath unto him the positive Laws of the Realm have a priviledg therein and restrain the Kings power which positive Laws whether by custom or otherwise established without repugnancy to the Laws of God and nature ought not less to be in force even in supernatural affairs of the Church whether in regard of Ecclesiastical Laws we willingly embrace that of Ambrose Imperator bonus intrae Ecclesiam non supra Ecclesiam est Kings have Dominion to exercise in Ecclesiastical causes but according to the Laws of the Church whether it be therefore the nature of Courts or the form of Pleas or the kind of Governours or the order of proceeding in whatsoever business for the received Laws an Lib 〈…〉 o the Church the King hath Supream Authority and power but against them never What such positive Laws hath appointed to be done by others than the King or by others with the King and in what form they have appointed the doing of it the same of necessity must be kept neither is the Kings sole Authority to alter it yet as it were a thing unreasonable if in civil affairs the King albeit the whole universal body did joyn with him should do any thing by their absolute power for the ordering of their state at home in prejudice of those ancient Laws of Nations which are of force throughout all the World because the necessary commerce of Kingdoms dependeth on them So in principal matters belonging to Christian Religion a thing very scandalous and offensive it must needs be thought if either Kings or Laws should dispose of the Law of God without any respect had unto that which of old hath been reverently thought of throughout the World and wherein there is no Law of God which forceth us to swerve from the ways wherein so many and holy Ages have gone Wherefore not without good consideration the very Law it self hath provided That Iudges Ecclesiastical appointed under the Kings Commission shall not adjudg for heresie anything but that which heretofore hathbeen adjudged by the Authority of the Cononical Scriptures or by the first four general Counbels or lysome other general Council wherein the same hath been declared heresie by the express words of the said Canonical Scriptures or such at hereafter shall be determined to be heresie by the high Court of Parliament of this Realm with the assent of the Clergy in the Convocation An. 1. Reg. Eliz. By which words of the Law Who doth not plainly see how that in one branch of proceeding by vertue of the Kings supream authority the credit which those four first general Councels have throughout
Persons and Causes of the Church But I see that hitherto they which condemn utterly the name so applyed do it because they mislike that such Power should be given to Civil Governours The great exception that Sir Thomas Moor took against that Title who suffered death for denyal of it was for that it maketh a Lay a Secular Person the head of the State Spiritual or Ecclesiastical as though God himself did not name Said the Head of all the Tribes of Israel and consequently of that Tribe also among the rest whereunto the State Spiritual or Ecclesiastical belonged when the Authors of the Centuries reprove it in Kings and Civil Governours the reason is I st is non competit iste Primatus such kinde of Power is too high for them they fit it not In excuse of Mr. Calvin by whom this Realm is condemned of Blasphemy for intituâ—ing H. 8. Supream Head of this Church under Christ a charitable conjecture is made that he spake by misinformation howbeit as he professeth utter dislike of that name so whether the name be used or no the very Power it self which we give unto Civil Magistrates he much complaineth of and protesteth That their Power over all things was it which had ever wounded him deeply That un-advised Persons had made them too Spiritual that throughout Germany this fault did reign that in these very parts where Calvin himself was it prevailed more than was to be wished that Rulers by imagining themselves so Spiritual have taken away Ecclesiastical Government that they think they cannot reign unless they abolish all the Authority of the Cuurch and be themselves the chief Iudges as well in Doctrine as in the whole Spiritual Regency So that in truth the Question is Whether the Magistrate by being Head in such sense as we term him do use or exercise any part of that Authority not which belongeth unto Christ but which other men ought to have These things being first considered thus it will be easier to judge concerning our own estate whether by force of Ecclesiastical Government Kings have any other kinde of Prerogative that they may lawfully hold and enjoy It is as some do imagine too much that Kings of England should be termed Heads in relation of the Church That which we do understand by Headship is their only Supreme Power in Ecclesiastical Affairs and Causes That which lawful Princes are what should make it unlawful for men in Spiritual Stiles or Titles to signifie If the having of Supream Power be allowed why is the expressing thereof by the Title of Head condemned They seem in words at leastwise some of them now at the length to acknowledge that Kings may have Dominion or Supream Government even over all both Persons and Causes We in terming our Princes Heads of the Church do but testifie that we acknowledge them such Governours Again to this it will peradventure be replyed That howsoever we interpret our selves it is not fit for a mortal man and therefore not fit for a Civil Magistrate to be intituled the Head of the Church which was given to our Saviour Christ to lift him above all Powers Rules Dominions Titles in Heaven or in Earth Where if this Title belong also to Civil Magistrates then it is manifest that there is a Power in Earth whereunto our Saviour Christ is not in this point superiour Again if the Civil Magistrate may have this Title he may be termed also the first-begotten of all Creatures The first begotten of all the Dead yea the Redeemer of his People For these are alike given him as Dignities whereby he is lifted up above all Creatures Besides this the whole Argument of the Apostle in both places doth lead to show that this Title Head of the Church cannot be said of any Creature And further the very domonstrative Articles amongst the Hebrews especially whom St. Paul doth follow serveth to tye that which is verified of one unto himself alone so that when the Apostle doth say that Christ it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Head it is as if he should say Christ and none other is the Head of the Church Thus have we against the entituling of the Highest Magistrate head with relation unto the Church four several Arguments gathered by strong surmise out of words marvellous unlikely to have been written to any such purpose as that whereunto they are now used and urged To the Ephesians the Apostle writeth That Christ God had set on his right hand in the Heavenly places above all Regency and Authority and Power and Dominion and whatsoever name is named not in this World only but in that which shall be also and hath under his feet set all things and hath given him head above all things unto the Church which is his Body even the fulness of him which accomplisheth all in all To the Colossians in like manner That he is the head of the body of the Church who is a first born Regency out of the dead to the end he might be made amongst them all such an one as both the Chiefty He meaneth amongst all them whom he mentioned before saying By him all things that are were made the things in the Heavens and the things in the Earth the things that are visible and the things that are invisible whether they be Thrones or Dominions or Regencies c. Unto the fore-alledged Arguments therefore we answer First that it is not simply the title of Head in such sort understood as the Apostle himself meant it so that the same being imparted in another sense unto others doth not any wayes make those others his Equals in as much as diversity of things is usually to be understood even when of words there is no diversity and it is onely the adding of one and the same thing unto divers Persons which doth argue equality in them If I term Christ and Cesar Lords yet this is no equalizing Cesar with Christ because it is not thereby intended To term the Emperor Lord saith Tertullian I for my part will not refuse so that I be not required to call him Lord in the same sense that God is so termed Neither doth it follow which is objected in the second place that if the Civil Magistrate may be intituled a Head he may as well be termed the first begotten of all Creatures the first begotten of the Dead and the Redeemer of his People For albeit the former dignity doth lift him up to less than these yet these terms are not applyable and apt to signifie any other inferior dignity as the former term of Head was The Argument of matter which the Apostle followeth hath small evidence or proof that his meaning was to appropriate unto Christ that the aforesaid title otherwise than only in such sense as doth make it being so understood too high to be given to any Creature As for the force of the Article where our Lord and Saviour is called the Head it serveth
hands of our Lord Jesus Christ with all reverence not disdaining to be taught and admonished by them nor with-holding from them as much as the least part of their due and decent honour All which for any thing that hath been alleadged may stand very well without resignation of Supremacy of Power in making Laws even Laws concerning the most Spiritual Affairs of the Church which Laws being made amongst us are not by any of us so taken or interpreted as if they did receive their force from power which the Prince doth communicate unto the Parliament or unto any other Court under him but from Power which the whole Body of the Realm being naturally possest with hath by free and deliberate assent derived unto him that ruleth over them so farr forth as hath been declared so that our Laws made concerning Religion do take originally their essence from the power of the whole Realm and Church of England than which nothing can be more consonant unto the law of Nature and the will of our Lord Jesus Christ. To let these go and return to our own Men Ecclesiastical Governours they say may not meddle with making of Civil Laws and of Laws for the Common-wealth nor the Civil Magistrate high or low with making of Orders for the Church It seemeth unto me very strange that these men which are in no cause more vehement and fierce than where they plead that Ecclesiastical Persons may not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be Lords should hold that the power of making Ecclesiastical Laws which thing of all other is most proper unto Dominion belongeth to none but Ecclesiastical Persons onely Their oversight groweth herein for want of exact observation what it is to make a Law Tully speaking of the Law of Nature saith That thereof God himself was Inventor Disceptator Lator the Deviser the Discusser and Deliverer wherein he plainly alludeth unto the chiefest parts which then did appertain to his Publick action For when Laws were made the first thing was to have them devised thesecond to sift them with as much exactness of Judgement as any way might be used the next by solemn voyce of Soveraign Authority to pass them and give them the force of Laws It cannot in any reason seem otherwise than most fit that unto Ecclesiastical Persons the care of devising Ecclesiastical Laws be committed even as the care of Civil unto them which are in those Affairs most skilful This taketh not away from Ecclesiastical Persons all right of giving voyce with others when Civil Laws are proposed for Regiment of the Common-wealth whereof themselves though now the World would have them annihilated are notwithstanding as yet a part much less doth it cut off that part of the power of Princes whereby as they claim so we know no reasonable cause wherefore we may not grant them without offence to Almighty God so much Authority in making all manner of Laws within their own Dominions that neither Civil nor Ecclesiastical do pass without their Royal assent In devising and discussing of Laws Wisdom especially is required but that which establisheth them and maketh them is Power even Power of Dominion the Chiefty whereof amongst us resteth in the Person of the King Is there any Law of Christs which forbiddeth Kings and Rulers of the Earth to have such Soveraign and Supream Power in the making of Laws either Civil or Ecclesiastical If there be our controversie hathan end Christ in his Church hath not appointed any such Law concerning Temporal Power as God did of old unto the Common-wealth of Israel but leaving that to be at the World 's free choice his chiefest care is that the Spiritual Law of the Gospel might be published farr and wide They that received the Law of Christ were for a long time People scattered in sundry Kingdoms Christianity not exempting them from the Laws which they had been subject unto saving only in such cases as those Laws did injoyn that which the Religion of Christ did forbid Hereupon grew their manifold Persecutions throughout all places where they lived as oft as it thus came to pass there was no possibility that the Emperours and Kings under whom they lived should meddle any whit at all with making Laws for the Church From Christ therefore having received Power who doubteth but as they did so they might binde them to such Orders as seemed fittest for the maintenance of their Religion without the leave of high or low in the Common-wealth for as much as in Religion it was divided utterly from them and they from it But when the mightiest began to like of the Christian Faith by their means whole Free-States and Kingdoms became obedient unto Christ. Now the question is Whether Kings by embracing Christianity do thereby receive any such Law as taketh from them the weightiest part of that Soveraignty which they had even when they were Heathens Whether being Infidels they might do more in causes of Religion than now they can by the Laws of God being true Believers For whereas in Regal States the King or Supream Head of the Common-wealth had before Christianity a supream stroak in making of Laws for Religion he must by embracing Christian Religion utterly deprive himself thereof and in such causes become subject unto his Subjects having even within his own Dominions them whose commandment he must obey unlesse his Power be placed in the Head of some foreign Spiritual Potentate so that either a foreign or domestical Commander upon Earth he must admit more now than before he had and that in the chiefest things whereupon Common-wealths do stand But apparent it is unto all men which are not Strangers unto the Doctrine of Jesus Christ that no State of the World receiving Christianity is by any Law therein contained bound to resign the Power which they lawfully held before but over what Persons and in what causes soever the same hath been in force it may so remain and continue still That which as Kings they might do in matters of Religion and did in matter of false Religion being Idolatrous and Superstitious Kings the same they are now even in every respect fully authorized to do in all affairs pertinent to the state of true Christian Religion And concerning the Supream Power of making Laws for all Persons in all causes to be guided by it is not to be let passe that the head Enemies of this Headship are constrained to acknowledge the King endued even with this very Power so that he may and ought to exercise the same taking order for the Church and her affairs of what nature of kinde soever in case of necessity as when there is no lawful Ministry which they interpret then to be and this surely is a point very remarkable wheresoever the Ministry is wicked A wicked Ministry is no lawful Ministry and in such sort no lawful Ministry that what doth belong unto them as Ministers by right of their calling the same to be annihilated in
necessary for decision of Controversies rising between man and man and for correction of faults committed in the Affairs of God unto the due execution whereof there are three things necessary Laws Judges and Supream Governours of Judgements What Courts there shall be and what causes shall belong unto each Court and what Judges shall determine of every cause and what Order in all Judgements shall be kept of these things the Laws have sufficiently disposed so that his duty who sitteth in any such Court is to judge not of but after the same Law Imprimis illud observare debet Iudex ne aliter judicet quam legibus constitutionibus aut moribus proditum est ut Imperator Iustinianaus which Laws for we mean the positive Laws of our Realm concerning Ecclesiastical Affairs if they otherwise dispose of any such thing than according to the Law of Reason and of God we must both acknowledge them to be amiss and endeavour to have them reformed But touching that point what may be objected shall after appear Our Judges in Causes Ecclesiastical are either Ordinary or Commissionary Ordinary those whom we term Ordinaries and such by the Laws of this Land are none but Prelates onely whose Power to do that which they do is in themselves and belonging to the nature of their Ecclesiastical calling In Spiritual Causes a Lay-Person may be no Ordinary a Commissionary Judge there is no lett but that he may be and that our Laws do evermore referr the ordinary Judgement of Spiritual Causes unto Spiritual Persons such as are termed Ordinaries no man which knoweth any thing of the Practice of this Realm can easily be ignorant Now besides them which are Authorized to judge in several Territories there is required an universal Power which reacheth over all imparting Supream Authority of Government over all Courts all Judges all Causes the operation of which Power is as well to strengthen maintain and uphold particular Jurisdictions which haply might else be of small effect as also to remedy that which they are not able to help and to redress that wherein they at any time do otherwise than they ought to do This Power being sometime in the Bishop of Rome who by sinister Practises had drawn it into his hands was for just considerations by Publick consent annexed unto the Kings Royal Seat and Crown from thence the Authors of Reformation would translate it into their National Assemblies or Synods which Synods are the onely helps which they think lawful to use against such Evils in the Church as particular Jurisdictions are not sufficient to redress In which Cause our Laws have provided that the Kings supereminent Authority and Power shall serve As namely when the whole Ecclesiastical State or the Principal Persons therein do need Visitation and Reformation when in any part of the Church Errours Schismes Herusies Abuses Offences Contempts Enormities are grown which men in their several Jurisdictions either do not or cannot help Whatsoever any Spiritual Authority and Power such as Legates from the See of Rome did sometimes exercise hath done or might heretofore have done for the remedies of those Evils in lawful sort that is to say without the violation of the Laws of God or Nature in the deed done as much in every degree our Laws have fully granted that the King for ever may do not onely be setting Ecclesiastical Synods on work that the thing may be their Act and the King their Motioner unto it for so much perhaps the Masters of the Reformation will grant but by Commissions few or many who having the Kings Letters Patents may in the vertue thereof execute the premises as Agents in the right not of their own peculiar and ordinary but of his supereminent Power When men are wronged by inferiour Judges or have any just cause to take exception against them their way for Redress is to make their Appeal and Appeal is a present delivery of him which maketh it out of the hands of their Power and Jurisdictions from whence it is made Pope Alexander having sometimes the King of England at advantage caused him amongst other things to agree that as many of his Subjects as would might have appeal to the Court of Rome And thus saith one that whereunto a mean Person at this day would scorn to submit himself so great a King was content to he subject to Notwithstanding even when the Pope saith he had so great Authority amongst Princes which were farr off the Romans he could not frame to obedience nor was able to obtain that himself might abide at Rome though promising not to meddle with other than Ecclesiastical Affairs So much are things that terrifie more feared by such as behold them aloof off than at hand Reformers I doubt not in some Causes will admit Appeals but Appeals made to their Synods even as the Church of Rome doth allow of them so they be made to the Bishop of Rome As for that kinde of Appeal which the English Laws do approve from the Judge of any certain particular Court unto the King as the onely Supream Governour on Earth who by his Delegates may give a final definitive Sentence from which no farther Appeal can be made Will their Plat-form allow of this Surely forasmuch as in that estate which they all dream of the whole Church must be divided into Parishes in which none can have greater or less Authority and Power than another again the King himself must be but a common Member in the Body of his own Parish and the causes of that onely Parish must be by the Officers thereof determinable In case the King had so much favour or preferment as to be made one of those Officers for otherwise by their positions he were not to meddle any more than the meanest amongst his Subjects with the Judgement of any Ecclesiastical Cause how is it possible they should allow of Appeals to be made from any other abroad to the King To receive Appeals from all other Judges belongeth to the highest in power of all and to be in power over All as touching Judgment in Ecclesiastical Causes this as they think belongeth onely to Synods Whereas therefore with us Kings do exercise over all Things Persons and Causes Supream Power both of voluntary and litigious Jurisdictionsâ— so that according to the one they incite reform and command according to the other they judge universally doing both in farr other sort than such as have ordinary Spiritual power oppugned we are herein by some colourable shew of Argument as if to grant thus much to any Secular Person it were unreasonable For sith it is say they apparent out of the Chronicles that judgement in Church-matters pertaineth to God Seeing likewise it is evident out of the Apostles that the High-Priest is set over those matters in Gods behalf It must needs follow that the Principality or direction of the Iudgment of them is by Gods ordinance appertaining to the High-Priest and
them who use but that Power which Laws have given them unless men can shew that there is in those Laws some manifest iniquity or injustice Whereas therefore against the force Judicial and Imperial which Supream Authority hath it is alledged how Constantine termeth Church-Officers Over-seers of things within the Church himself of those without the Church how Augustine witnesseth that the Emperor not daring to judge of the Bishop's Cause committed it to the Bishops and was to crave paâ—â—â—on of the Bishops for that by the Donatists importunity which made no end to appealing unto him he was being weary of them drawn to give sentence in a matter of theirs how Hilary beseecheth the Emperor Constance to provide that the Governors of his Provinces should not presume to take upon them the Judgement of Ecclesiastical Causes to whom onely Common-wealth matters belonged how Ambrose affirmeth that Palaces belong unto the Emperor Churches to the Minister That the Emperor hath the authority over the Common-walls of the City and not in holy things for which cause he never would yield to have the Causes of the Church debated in the Princes Consistories but excused himself to the Emperor Valentinian for that being convented to answer concerning Church-matters in a Civil Court he came not We may by these testimonies drawn from Antiquity if wellst to consider them discern how requisite it is that Authority should always follow received Laws in the manner of proceeding For inasmuch as there was at the first no certain Law determining what force the principal Civil Magistrates authority should be of how farr it should reach and what order it should observe but Christian Emperors from time to time did what themselves thought most reasonable in those affairs by this means it cometh to passe that they in their practise vary and are not uniform Vertuous Emperors such as Constantine the Great was made conscience to swerve unnecessarily from the custom which had been used in the Church even when it lived under Infidels Constantine of reverence to Bishops and their Spiritual Authority rather abstained from that which himself might lawfully do than was willing to claim a Power not fit or decent for him to exercise The Order which hath been before he ratifieth exhorting the Bishops to look to the Church and promising that he would do the Office of a Bishop over the Common-wealth which very Constantine notwithstanding did not thereby so renounce all Authority in judging of Special Causes but that sometime he took as St. Augustine witnesseth even personal cognition of them howbeit whether as purposing to give therein judicially any Sentence I stand in doubt for if the other of whom St. Augustine elsewhere speaketh did in such sort judge surely there was cause why he should excuse it as a thing not usually done Otherwise there is no lett but that any such great Person may hear those Causes to and fro debated and deliver in the end his own opinion of them declaring on which side himself doth judge that the truth is But this kinde of Sentence bindeth no side to stand thereunto it is a Sentence of private perswasion and not of solemn jurisdiction albeit a King or an Emperour pronounce it Again on the contrary part when Governours infected with Heresie were possessed of the Highest Power they thought they might use it as pleased themselves to further by all means that opinion which they desired should prevail they not respecting at all what was meet presumed to command and judge all men in all Causes without either care of orderly proceeding or regard to such Laws and Customs as the Church had been wont to observe So that the one sort feared to do even that which they might and that which the other ought not they boldly presumed upon the one sort of modesty excused themselves where they scarce needed the other though doing that which was inexcusable bare it out with main power not enduring to be told by any man how farr they roved beyond their bounds So great odds was between them whom before we mentioned and such as the younger Valentinian by whom St. Ambrose being commanded to yield up one of the Churches under him unto the Arrians whereas they which were sent on his Message alledged That the Emperour did but use his own right forasmuch as all things were in his power The Answer which the holy Bishop gave them was That the Church is the House of God and that those things that are Gods are not to be yielded up and disposed of it at the Emperors will and pleasure His Palaces he might grant to whomsoever he pleaseth but Gods own Habitation not so A cause why many times Emperours do more by their absolute Authority than could very well stand with reason was the over-great importunity of wicked Hereticks who being Enemies to Peace and Quietness cannot otherwise than by violent means be supported In this respect therefore we must needs think the state of our own Church much better settled than theirs was because our Lawes have with farr more certainty prescribed bounds unto each kinde of Power All decision of things doubtful and correction of things amiss are proceeded in by order of Law what Person soever he be unto whom the administration of Judgment belongeth It is neither permitted unto Prelates nor Prince to judge and determine at their own discretion but Law hath prescribed what both shall do What Power the King hath he hath it by Law the bounds and limits of it are known the intire Community giveth general order by Law how all things publickly are to be done and the King as the Head thereof the Highest in Authority over all causeth according to the same law every particular to be framed and ordered thereby The whole Body Politick maketh Laws which Laws gave Power unto the King and the King having bound himself to use according unto Law that power it so falleth out that the execution of the one is accomplished by the other in most religious and peaceable sort There is no cause given unto any to make supplication as Hilary did that Civil Governors to whom Common-wealth-matters only belong may not presume to take upon them the Judgement of Ecclesiastical causes If the cause be Spiritual Secular Courts do not meddle with it we need not excuse our selves with Ambrose but boldly and lawfully we may refuse to answer before any Civil Judge in a matter which is not Civil so that we do not mistake either the nature of the Cause or of the Court as we easily may do both without some better direction than can be by the rules of this new-found Discipline But of this most certain we are that our Laws do neither suffer a Spiritual Court to entertain those Causes which by the Law are Civil nor yet if the matter be indeed Spiritual a mere Civil Court to give Judgement of it Touching Supream Power therefore to command all men and in all manner
regard the present State of the highest Governor placed over us if the quality and disposition of our Nobles if the Orders and Laws of our famous Universities if the Profession of the Civil or the Practice of the Common Law amongst us if the mischiefs whereinto even before our eyes so many others have faln head-long from no less plausible and fair beginnings then yours are There is in every of these Considerations most just cause to fear lest our hastiness to embrace a thing of so perilous consequence should cause Posterity to feel those evils which as yet are more easie for us to prevent then they would be for them to remedy 9. The best and safest way for you therefore my dear Brethren is To call your Deeds past to a new reckoning to re-examine the cause ye have taken in hand and to try it even point by point argument by argument with all the diligent exactness ye can to lay aside the Gall of that Bitterness wherein your mindes have hitherto ever-abounded and with meekness to search the Truth Think ye are Men deem it not impossible for you to err sift unpartially your own hearts whether it be force of Reason or vehemency of Affection which hath bred and still doth feed these Opinions in you If Truth do any where manifest it self seek not to smother it with gloâ—ing Delusion acknowledge the greatness thereof and think it your best Victory when the same doth prevail over youâ— That ye have been earnest in speaking or writing again and again the contrary way should be noblemish or discredit at all unto you Amongst so many so huge Volumes as the infinite pains of St. Augustine have brought forth what one hath gotten him greater love commendation and honor then the Book wherein he carefully collecteth his own over-sights and sincerely condemneth them Many speeches there are of Jobs whereby his Wisdom and other Vertues may appear but the glory of an ingenuous minde he hath purchased by these words onely Behold I will lay mine hand on my mouth I have spoken once yet will I not therefore maintain Argument yea twice howbeit for that cause further I will not proceed Far more comfort it were for us so small is the joy we take in these strises to labor under the same yoke as men that look for the same eternal reward of their labors to be enjoyned with you in Bands of indissoluble Love and Amity to live as if our persons being many our souls were but one rather than in such dismembred sort to spend our few and wretched days in a tedious prosecuting of wearisome contentions the end whereof if they have not some speedy end will be heavy even on both sides Brought already we are even to that estate which Gregory Nazianzen mournfully describeth saying My minde leadeth me sith there is no other remedy to flie and to convey my self into some corner out of sight where I may scape from this cloudy tempest of maliciousness whereby all parts are entred into a deadly war amongst themselves and that little remnant of love which was is now consumed to nothing The onely godliness we glory in is to finde out somewhat whereby we may judge others to be ungodly Each others faults we observe as matter of exprobration and not of grief By these means we are grown hateful in the eyes of the Heathens themselves and which woundeth us the more deeply able we are not to deny but that we have deserved their hatred With the better sort of our own our fame and credit is clean lost The less we are to marvel if they judge vilely of us who although we did well would hardly allow thereof On our backs they also build that are leud and what we object one against another the same they use to the utter scorn and disgrace of us all This we have gained by our mutual home-dissentions This we are worthily rewarded with which are more forward to strive then becometh men of vertuous and milde disposition But our trust in the Almighty is that with us Contentions are now at the highest flote and that the day will come for what cause of despair is there when the Passions of former Enmity being allayed we shall with ten times redoubled tokens of our unfeignedly reconciled love shew our selves each towards other the same which Joseph and the Brethren of Joseph were at the time of their enterview in Egypt Our comfortable expectation and most thirsty desire whereof what man soever amongst you shall any way help to satisfie as we truly hope there is no one amongst you but some way or other will The blessings of the God of Peace both in this World and in the World to come be upon him more then the Stars of the Firmament in number WHAT THINGS ARE HANDLED In the following BOOKS BOOK I. COncerning LAWS in General BOOK II. Of the use of Divine Law contained in Scripture Whether that be the onely Law which ought to serve for our Direction in all things without exception BOOK III. Of Laws concerning Ecclesiastical Polity Whether the Form thereof be in Scripture so set down that no Addition or Charge is lawful BOOK IV. Of General Exceptions taken against the Laws of our Polity as being Popish and banished out of certain Reformed Churches BOOK V. Of our Laws that concern the Publick Religious Duties of the Church and the manner of bestowing that Power of Order which enableth Men in sundry Degrees and Callings to execute the same BOOK VI. Of the Power of Iurisdiction which the Reformed Platform claimeth unto Lay-Elders with others BOOK VII Of the Power of Iurisdiction and the Honor which is annexed thereunto in Bishops BOOK VIII Of the Power of Ecclesiastical Dominion or Supream Authority which with us the highest Governor or Prince hath as well in regard of Domestical Iurisdictions as of that other Foreignly claimed by the Bishop of Rome OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity BOOK I. Concerning Laws and their several kindes in general The Matter contained in this First Book 1. THe cause of Writing this General Discourse concerning Laws 2. Of that Law which God from before the beginning hath set for himself to do all things by 3. The Law which Natural Agents observe and their necessary manner of keeping it 4. The Law which the Angels of God obey 5. The Law whereby Man is in his Actions directed to the Imitation of God 6. Mens first beginning to understand that Law 7. Of Mans Will which is the first thing that Laws of Action are made to guide 8. Of the Natural finding out of Laws by the Light of Reason to guide the Will unto that which is good 9. Of the benefit of keeping that Law which Reason teacheth 10. How Reason doth lead Men unto the making of Humane Laws whereby Politick Societies are governed and to agreement about Laws whereby the Fellowship or Communion of Independent Societies stanoeth 11. Wherefore God hath by Scripture
all Churches and evermore had was judged by the making of the aforesaid Act a just cause wherefore they should be mentioned in that case as a requisite part of that rule wherewith Dominion was to be limited But of this we shall further consider when we come unto that which Soveraign Power may do in making Ecclesiastical Laws Unto which Supream Power in Kings two kinds of adversaries there are which have opposed themselvs one sort defending That Supream power in causes Ecclesiastical throughout the world appertaineth of Divine Right to the Bishop of Rome Another sort That the said power belongeth in every national Church unto the Clergy thereof assembled We which defend as well against the one as against the other That Kings within their own Precincts may have it must shew by what right it must come unto them First unto me it seemeth almost out of doubt controversie that every independent multitude before any certain form of Regiment established hath under God Supream Authority full Dominion over it self even as a man not tyed with the band of subjection as yet unto any other hath over himself the like power God creating mankind did endue it naturally with power to guide it self in what kind of Society soever he should chuse to live A man which is born Lord of himself may be made an others servant And that power which naturally whole societies have may be derived unto many few or one under whom the rest shall then live in subjection Some multitudes are brought into subjection by force as they who being subdued are fain to submit their necks unto what yoak it pleaseth their Conquerors to lay upon them which Conquerors by just and lawful Wars do hold their power over such multitudes as a thing descending unto them Divine Providence it self so disposing For it is God who giveth victory in the day of War and unto whom Dominion in this sort is derived the same they enjoy according to the Law of Nations which Law authorizeth Conquerours to reign as absolute Lords over them whom they vanquish Sometimes it pleaseth God himself by special appointment to chuse out and nominate such as to whom Dominion shall be given which thing he did often in the Common-wealth of Israel They which in this sort receive power immediately from God have it by meer Divine Right they by humane on whom the same is bestowed according to mens discretion when they are left freely by God to make choice of their own Governours By which of these means soever it happen that Kings or Governors be advanced unto their Estates we must acknowledg both their lawful choice to be approved of God and themselves to be Gods Lievtenants and cofess their Power which they have to be his As for Supream Power in Ecclesiastical affairs the Word of God doth no where appoint that all Kings should have it neither that any should not have it for which cause it seemeth to stand altogether by humane Right that unto Christian Kings there is such Dominion given Again on whom the same is bestowed at mens discretions they likewise do hold it by Divine Right If God in his revealed Word hath appointed such Power to be although himself extraordinarily bestow it not but leave the appointment of persons to men yea albeit God do neither appoint nor assign the person nevertheless when men have assigned and established both Who doth doubt but that sundry duties and affairs depending thereupon are prescribed by the Word of God and consequently by that very right to be exacted For example sake the power which Romane Emperors had over foreign Provinces was not a thing which the Law of God did ever Institute Neither was Tiberius Caesar by especial Commission from Heaven therewith invested and yet paiment of Tribute unto Caesar being now made Emperor is the plain Law of Jesus Christ unto Kings by humane Right Honor by very Divine Right is due mans Ordinances are many times proposed as grounds in the Statutes of God And therefore of what kind soever the means be whereby Governors are lawfully advanced to their States as we by the Laws of God stand bound meekly to acknowledg them for Gods Lieutenants and to confess their Power his So by the same Law they are both authorized and required to use that Power as far as it may be in any State available to his Honor. The Law appointeth no man to be a husband but if a man hath betaken himself unto that condition it giveth him power Authority over his own Wife That the Christian world should be ordered by the Kingly Regiment the Law of God doth not any where command and yet the Law of God doth give them which once are exalted unto that place of Estate right to exact at the hands of their Subjects general obedience in whatsoever affairs their power may serve to command and God doth ratifie works of that Soveraign Authority which Kings have received by men This is therefore the right whereby Kings do hold their power but yet in what sort the same doth rest and abide in them it somewhat behoveth further to search where that we be not enforced to make overlarge discourses about the different conditions of Soveraign or Supream Power that which we speak of Kings shall be in respect of the State and according to the nature of this Kingdom where the people are in no subjection but such as willingly themselves have condescended unto for their own most behoo◠and security In Kingdoms therefore of this quality the highest Governor hath indeed universall Dominion but with dependency upon that whole entire body over the several parts whereof he hath Dominion so that it standeth for an Axiom in this case The King is Major singulis universis minor The Kings dependency we do not construe as some have done who are of opinion that no mans birth can make him a King but every particular person advanced to such Authority hath at his entrance into his Raign the same bestowed on him as an estate in condition by the voluntary deed of the people in whom it doth lie to put by any one and to preferr some other before him better liked of or judged fitter for the place and that the party so rejected hath no injury done unto him no although the same be done in a place where the Crown doth go 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by succession and to a person which is capital and hath apparently if blood be respected the nearest right They plainly affirm in all well appointed Kingdoms the custom evermore hath been and is that children succeed not their Parents till the people after a sort have created them anew neither that that they grow to their Fathers as natural and proper Heirs but are then to be reckoned for Kings when at the hands of such as represent the Kings Majesty they have by a Scepter and a Diadem received as it were the investure of Kingly power Their
in dealing is tyed unto the soundest perfectest and most indifferent Rule which Rule is the Law I mean not only the Law of Nature and of God but the National Law consonant thereunto Happier that people whose Law is their King in the greatest things then that whose King is himself their Law where the King doth guide the State and the Law the King that Common-wealth is like an Harp or Melodious Instrument the strings whereof are turned and handled all by one hand following as Laws the Rules and Canons of Musical Science Most divinely therefore Archytas maketh unto publike felicity these four steps and degrees every of which doth spring from the former as from another cause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The King ruling by Law the Magistrate following the Subject free and the whole Society happy Adding on the contrary side that where this order is not it cometh by transgression thereof to pass that a King groweth a Tyrant he that ruleth under him abhorreth to be guided by him or commanded the people subject unto both have freedome under neither and the whole Community is wretched In which respect I cannot chuse but commend highly their wisdom by whom the Foundations of the Common-wealth hath been laid wherein though no manner of Person or cause be unsubject unto the Kings Power yet so is the Power of the King over all and in all limited that unto all his proceedings the Law it self is a rule The Axioms of our Regal Government are these Lex facit regem The Kings Grant of any favour made contrary to the Law is void Rex nibil potest nisi quod jure potest Our Kings therefore when they are to take possession of the Crown they are called unto have it pointed our before their eyes even by the very Solemnities and Rites of their Inauguration to what affairs by the same Law their Supream Power and Authority reacheth crowned we see they are enthronized and annointed the Crown a Sign of a Military Dominion the Throne of Sedentary or Judicial the Oyl of Religious and Sacred Power It is not on any side denied that Kings may have Authority in Secular affairs The Question then is What power they may lawfully have and exercise in causes of God A Prince or Magistrate or a Community saith Doctor Stapleton may have power to lay corporal punishment on them which are teachers of perverse things power to make Laws for the Peace of the Church Power to proclaim to defend and even by revenge to preserve dogmata the very Articles of Religion themselves from violation Others in affection no less devoted unto the Papacy do likewise yield that the Civil Magistrate may by his Edicts and Laws keep all Ecclesiastical Persons within the bounds of their duties and constrain them to observe the Canons of the Church to follow the rule of ancient Discipline That if Ioash was commended for his care and provision concerning so small a part of Religion as the Church-treasure it must needs be both unto Christian Kings themselves greater honour and to Christianity a larger benefit when the custody of Religion and the worship of God in general is their charge It therefore all these things mentioned be most properly the affairs of Gods Ecclesiastical causes if the actions specified be works of power and if that power be such as Kings may use of themselves without the fear of any other power superior in the same thing it followeth necessarily that Kings may have supream power not only in Civil but also in Ecclesiastical affairs and consequently that they may withstand what Bishop or Pope soever shall under the pretended claim of higher Spiritual Authority oppose themselves against their proceedings But they which have made us the former grant will never hereunto condescend what they yield that Princes may do it is with secret exception always understood If the Bishop of Rome give leave if he enterpose no prohibition wherefore somewhat it is in shew in truth nothing which they grant Our own Reformes do the very like when they make their discourse in general concerning the Authority which Magistrates may have a man would think them to be far from withdrawing any jot of that which with reason may be thought due The Prince and Civil Magistrate saith one of them hath to see the Laws of God touching his Worship and touching all Matters and all Orders of the Church to be executed and duly observed and to see every Ecclesiastical Person do that office whereunto he is appointed and to punish those which fail in their office accordingly Another acknowledgeth That the Magistrate may lawfully uphold all truth by his Sword punish all persons enforce all to their duties towards God and men maintain by his Laws every point of Gods Word punish all vice in all men see into all causes visit the Ecclesiastical Estate and correct the abuses thereof Finally to look to his Subjects that under him they may lead their lives in all godliness and honesty◠A third more frankly prosesseth That in case their Church Discipline were established so little it shortneth the Arms of Soveraign Dominion in causes Ecclesiastical that Her Gracious Majesty for any thing they teach or hold to the contrary may no less then now remain still over all persons in all things Supream Governess even with that full and Royal Authority Superiority and Preheminence Supremacy and Prerogative which the Laws already established do give her and her Majesties Injunctions and the Articles of the Convocation house and other writings Apologetical of her Royal Authority and Supream Dignity do declare and explain Possidonius was wont to say of the Epicure That he thought there were no Gods but that those things which he spake concerning the Gods were only given out for fear of growing adious amongst men and therefore that in words he left gods remaining but in very deed overthrew them in so much as he gave them no kind of Action After the very self same manner when we come unto those particular effects Prerogatives of Dominion which the Laws of this Land do grant unto the Kings thereof it will appear how these men notwithstanding their large and liberal Speeches abate such parcels out of the afore alleadged grant and flourishing shew that a man comparing the one with the other may half stand in doubt lest their Opinion in very truth be against that Authority which by their Speeches they seem mightily to uphold partly for the avoiding of publike obloquie envie and hatred partly to the intent they may both in the cad by the establishment of their Discipline extinguish the force of Supream Power which Princes have and yet in the mean while by giving forth these smooth Discourses obtain that their savourers may have somewhat to alleadge for them by way of Apologie and that such words only sound towards all kind of fulness of Power But for my self I had rather construe such their contradictions in the better
part and impute their general acknowledgment of the lawfullness of Kingly Power unto the force of truth presenting it self before them sometimes above their particular contrarieties oppositions denyals unto that errour which having so fully possest their minds casteth things inconvenient upon them of which things in their due place Touching that which is now in hand weare on all sides fully agreed First that there is not any restraint or limitation of matter for regal Authority and Power to be conversant in but of Religion onely and of whatsoever cause thereunto appertaineth Kings may lawfully have change they lawfully may therein exercise Dominion and use the temporal Sword Secondly that some kind of actions conversant about such affairs are denyed unto Kings As namely Actions of Power and Order and of Spiritual Jurisdiction which hath with it inseparably joyned Power to Administer the Word and Sacraments power to Ordain to Judge as an Ordinary to bind and loose to Excommunicate and such like Thirdly that even in those very actions which are proper unto Dominion there must be some certain rule whereunto Kings in all their proceedings ought to be strictly tyed which rule for proceeding in Ecclesiasticall affairs and causes by Regal Power hath not hitherto been agreed upon with such uniform consent and certainty as might be wished The different sentences of men herein I will now go about to examine but it shall be enough to propose what Rule doth seem in this case most reasonable The case of deriving Supream Power from a whole intire multitude into some special part thereof as partly the necessity of expedition in publick affairs partly the inconvenience of confusion and trouble where a multitude of Equals dealeth and partly the dissipation which must needs ensue in companies where every man wholly seeketh his own particular as we all would do even with other mens hurts and haply the very overthrow of themselves in the end also if for the procurement of the common good of all men by keeping every several man is order some were not invested with Authority over all and encouraged with Prerogative-Honour to sustain the weighty burthen of that charge The good which is proper unto each man belongeth to the common good of all as part to the whole perfection but these two are things different for men by that which is proper are severed united they are by that which is common Wherefore besides that which moveth each man in particular to seek his own private good there must be of necessity in all publick Societies also a general mover directing unto common good and framing every mans particular unto it The end whereunto all Government was instituted was Bonum publicum the Universal or Common good Our question is of Dominion for that end and purpose derived into one such as all in one publick State have agreed that the Supream charge of all things should be committed unto one They I say considering what inconveniency may grow where States are subject unto sundry Supream Authorities have for fear of these inconveniencies withdrawn from liking to establish many 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the multitude of Supream Commanders is troublesome No Nan saith our Saviour can serve two Masters surely two supream Masters would make any ones service somewhat uneasie in such cases as might fall out Suppose that to morrow the Power which hath Dominion in Justice require thee at the Court that which in War at the Field that which in Religion at the Temple all have equal Authority over thee and impossible it is that then in such case thou shouldst be obedient unto all By chusing any one whom thou wilt obey certain thou art for thy disobedience to incur the displeasure of the other two But there is nothing for which some comparable reason or other may not be found are we able to shew any commendable State of Government which by experience and practice hath felt the benefit of being in all causes subject unto the Supream Authority of one Against the policy of the Israelites I hope there will no man except where Moses deriving so great a part of his burthen in Government unto others did notwithstanding retain to himself Universal Supremacy Iehosaphat appointing one to be chosen in the affairs of God and another in the Kings affair's did this as having Dominion over them in both If therefore from approbation of Heaven the Kings of Gods own chosen people had in the affairs of Jewish Religion Supream Power why not Christian Kings the like also in Christian Religion First unless men will answer as some have done That the Jews Religion was of far less perfection and dignity then ours our being that truth whereof theirs was but a shadowish prefigurative resemblance Secondly That all parts of their Religion their Laws their Sacrifices and their Rights and Ceremonies being fully set down to their hands and needing no more but only to be put in execution the Kings might well have highest Authority to see that done whereas with us there are a number of Mysteries even in Belief which were not so generally for them as for us necessary to be with sound express acknowledgement understood A number of things belonging to external Government and our manner of serving God not set down by particular Ordinances and delivered to us in writing for which cause the State of the Church doth now require that the Spiritual Authority of Ecclesiastical persons be large absolute and not subordinate to Regal power Thirdly That whereas God armeth Religion Iewish as Christian with the Temporal sword But of Spiritual punishment the one with power to imprison to scourge to put to death The other with bare authority to Censure and excommunicate There is no reason that the Church which hath no visible sword should in Regiment be subject unto any other power then only unto theirs which have authority to bind and loose Fourthly That albeit whilst the Church was restrained unto one people it seemed not incommodious to grant their King the general Chiefty of Power yet now the Church having spread it self over all Nations great inconveniences must therby grow if every Christian King in his several Territory shall have the like power Of all these differences there is not one which doth prove it a thing repugnant to the Law either of God or of Nature that all Supremacy of external Power be in Christian Kingdoms granted unto Kings thereof for preservation of quietness unity order and peace in such manner as hath been shewed Of the Title of Headship FOr the Title or State it self although the Laws of this Land have annexed it to the Crown yet so far◠we should not strive if so be men were nice and scrupulous in this behalf only because they do wish that for reverence to Christ Jesus the Civil Magistrate did rather use some other form of speech wherewith to express that Soveraign Authority which he lawfully hath overall both
in Sir Thomas Bodlies Library in that of Doctor Andrews late Bishop of Winton in the late Lord Conwayes in the Archbishop of Canterburies and in the Bishop of Armaghs and in many others and most of these pretended to be the Authors own hand but much disagreeing being indeed altered and diminisht as Men have thought fittest to make Mr. Hookers Judgment suit with their Fancies or give authority to their corrupt designs and for proof of a part of this take these following testimonies Doctor Barnard sometime Chaplain to Doctor Usher late Lord Archbishop of Armagh hath declar'd in a late Book called Clavi Trabales Printed by Richard Hodgkinson Anno 1661. that in his search and examination of the said Bishops Manuscripts he there found the three written Books which were the supposed sixth seventh and eighth of Mr. Hookers Books of Ecclesiastical Polity and that in the said three Books now printed as Mr. Hookers there are so many Omissions that they amount to many Paragraphs and which cause many incoherencies the Omissions are by him set down at large in the said Printed Book to which I refer the Reader for the whole but think fit in this place to insert this following short part of them First as there could be in Natural Bodies no Motion of any thing unless there were some first which moved all things and continued Unmoveable even so in Politick Societies there must be some unpunishable or else no Man shall suffer punishment for sith punishments proceed always from Superiors to whom the administration of Iustice belongeth which administration must have necessarily a Fountain that deriveth it to all others and receiveth not from any because otherwise the course of Iustice should go infinitely in a Circle every Superiour having his Superiour without end which cannot be therefore a well spring it followeth there is a Supreme head of Iustice whereunto all are subject but it self in subjection to none Which kinde of Preheminency if some ought to have in a Kingdom who but the King shall have it Kings therefore or no man can have lawfull power to Iudge If Private men offend there is the Magistrate over them which Iudgeth if Magistrates they have their Prince if Princes there is Heaven a Tribunal before which they shall appear on Earth they are not accomptable to any Here says the Doctor it breaks off abruptly And I have these words also attested under the hand of Mr. Fabian Phillips a man of note for his useful Books I will make Oath if I shall be required that Doctor Sanderson the late Bishop of Lincoln did a little before his Death affirm to me he had seen a Manuscript affirmed to him to be the hand-writing of Mr. Richard Hooker in which there was no mention made of the King or Supreme Governors being accomptable to the People this I will make Oath that that good Man attested to me Fabian Phillips So that there appears to be both Omissions and Additions in the said last three printed Books and this may probably be one Reason why Doctor Sanderson the said Learned Bishop whose writings are so highly and justly valued gave a strict charge near the time of his Death or in his last Will that nothing of his that was not already Printed should be Printed after his Death It is well known how high a value our Learned King Iames put upon the Books writ by Mr. Hooker as also that our late King Charls the Martyr for the Church valued them the second of all Books testified by his commending them to the reading of his Son Charls that now is our Gratious King and you may suppose that this Charls the First was not a stranger to the pretended three Books because in a discourse with the Lord Say when the said Lord required the King to grant the truth of his Argument because it was the Judgement of Mr. Hooker quoting him in one of the three written Books the King replyed they were not allowed to be Mr Hookers Books but however he would allow them to be Mr. Hookers and consent to what his Lordship proposed to prove out of those doubtful Books if he would but consent to the Iudgment of Mr. Hooker in the other five that were the undoubted Books of Mr. Hooker In this Relation concerning these three doubtful Books of Mr. Hookers my purpose was to enquire then set down what I observ'd and know which I have done not as an engaged Person but indifferently and now leave my Reader to give Sentence for their Legitimation as to himself but so as to leave others the same Liberty of believing or disbelieving them to be Mr. Hookers and 't is observable that as Mr. Hooker advis'd with Doctor Spencer in the design and manage of these Books so also and chiefly with this dear Pupil George Cranmer whose Sister was the Wife of Doctor Spencer of which this following Letter may be a Testimony and doth also give authority to some things mentioned both in this Appendix and in the Life of Mr. Hooker and is therefore added GEORGE CRANMERS LETTER UNTO Mr. RICHARD HOOKER February 1598. WHat Posterity is likely to judge of these matters concerning Church Discipline we may the better conjecture if we call to mind what our own Age within few years upon better Experience hath already judged concerning the same It may be remembred that at first the greatest part of the Learned in the Land were either eagerly affected or favourably inclined that way The Books then written for the most part savoured of the Disciplinary Stile it sounded everywhere in Pulpits and in common phrase of mens speech the contrary part began to fear they had taken a wrong course many which impugned the Discipline yet so impugned it not as not being the better form of Government but as not being so convenient for our State in regard of dangerous Innovations thereby like to grow one man alone there was to speak of whom let no suspition of flattery deprive of his deserved Commendation wâ—o in the defiance of the one part and courage of the other stood in the gap and gave others respite to prepare themselves to the defence which by the sudden eagerness and violence of their Adversaries had otherwise been prevented wherein God hath made good unto him his own Impress Vincit qui patitur for what contumelious indignities he hath at their hands sustained the world is witness and what reward of Honour above his Adversaries God hath bestowed upon him themselves though nothing glad thereof must needs confess Now of late years the heat of men towards the Discipline is greatly decayed their Judgements begin to sway on the other side the Learned have weighed it and found it light wise men conceive some fear left it prove not only not the best kind of Government but the very bane and destruction of all Government The cause of this Change in Mens Opinions may be drawn from the general nature of Error disguised and
small thing perswadeth them to change their opinions it behoveth that we vigilantly note and prevent by all means those evils whereby the hearts of men are lost which evils for the most part being personal do arm in such sort the Adversaries of God and his Church against us that if through our too much neglect and security the same should run on soon might we feel our estate brought to those lamentable terms whereof this hard and heavy sentence was by one of the Ancients uttered upon like occasions Dolens dico gemens denuncio sacerdotium quod apud nos intus cecidit foris diu stare non poterit But the gracious providence of Almighty God hath I trust put these Thorns of Contradiction in our sides lest that should steal upon the Church in a slumber which now I doubt not but through his assistance may be turned away from us bending thereunto our selves with constancy constancy in labor to do all men good constancy in Prayer unto God for all men Her especially whose sacred power matched with incomparable goodness of Nature hath hitherto been Gods most happy instrument by him miraculously kept for works of so miraculous preservation and safety unto others that as By the Sword of God and Gedeon was sometime the cry of the people of Israel so it might deservedly be at this day the joyful Song of innumerable multitudes yea the Emblem of some Estates and Dominions in the world and which must be eternally confest even with tears of thankfulness the true Inscription Stile or Title of all Churches as yet standing within this Realm By the goodness of Almighty God and his servant Elizabeth we areâ— That God who is able to make Mortality immortal give her such future continuance as may be no less glorious unto all Posterity then the days of Her Regiment past have been happy unto our selves and for his most dear Anointeds sake grant them all prosperity whose Labors Cares and Counsels unfeignedly are referred to Her endless welfare through his unspeakable mercy unto whom we all owe everlasting praise In which desire I will here rest humbly beseeching your Grace to pardon my great boldness and God to multiply his Blessings upon them that fear his Name Your Graces in all duty RICHARD HOOKER A PREFACE To them that seek as they term it The Reformation of Laws and Orders Ecclesiastical IN THE Church of England THough for no other cause yet for this That Posterity may know we have not loosly through silence permitted things to pass away as in a Dream there shall be for Mens information extant thus much concerning the present state of the Church of God established amongst us and their careful endeavor which would have uphold the same At your hands beloved in our Lord and Saviour Iesus Christ for in him the love which we bear unto all that would but seem to be born of him it is not the Sea of your Gall and Bitterness that shall ever drown I have no great cause to look for other then the self-same portion and lot which your manner hath been hitherto to lay on them that concur not in Opinion and Sentence with you But our hope it that the God of Peace shall notwithstanding mans nature too impatical of contumelious malediction enable us quietly and even gladly to suffer all things for that work sake which we covet to perform The wonderful seal and fervor wherewith ye have with stood the received Orders of this Church was the first thing which caused me to enter into consideration Whether as all your published Books and Writings peremptorily maintain every Christian man fearing God stand bound to joyn with you for the furtherance of that which ye term The Lords Discipline Wherein I must plainly confess unto you that before I examined your sundry Declarations in that behalf it could not settle in my head to think but that undoubtedly such numbers of otherwise right well-affected and most religiously enclined minds had some marvellous reasonable enducements which led them with so great earnestness that way But when once as near as my slender ability would serve I had with travel and care performed that part of the Apostles advice and counsel in such cases whereby be willeth to try all things and was come at the length so far that there remained only the other clause to be satisfied wherein he concludeth that what good is must be held There was in my poor understanding no remedy but to set down this as my final resolute perswasion Surely the present Form of Church Government which the Laws of this Land have established is such as no Law of God nor Reason of Man hath hitherto been alledged of force sufficient to prove they do ill who to the uttermost of their power withstand the alteration thereof Contrariwise The other which instead of it we are required to accept is onely by Error and misconceipt named the Ordinance of Jesus Christ no one Proof as yet brought forth whereby it may clearly appear to be so in very deed The Explication of which two things I have here thought good to offer into your own hands Heartily beseeching you even by the Meekness of Iesus Christ whom I trust ye love That as ye tender the Peace and Quietness of this Church if there be in you that gracious Humility which hath ever been the Crown and Glory of a Christianly disposed minde If your own souls hearts and consciences the sound integrity whereof can but hardly stand with the refusal of Truth in personal respects be as I doubt not but they are things most dear and precious unto you Let not the Faith which ye have in our Lord Jesus Christ be blemished with partialities regard not who it is which speaketh but weigh onely what is spoken Think not that ye read the words of one who bendeth himself as an Adversary against the Truth which ye have already embraced but the words of one who desireth even to embrace together with you the self same Truth if it be the Truth and for that cause for no other God he knoweth hath undertaken the burthensom labor of this painful kinde of Conference For the plainer access whereunto let it be lawful for me to rip up the very bottom how and by whom your Discipline was planted at such time as this age we live in began to make first tryal thereof 2. A Founder it had whom for mine own part I think incomparably the wisest man that ever the French Church did injoy since the hour it injoyed him His bringing up was in the study of the Civil Law Divine knowledge he gathered not by hearing or reading so much as by teaching others For though thousands were debters to him as touching knowledge in that kinde yet be to none but onely to God the Author of that most blessed Fountain The Book of Life and of the admirable dexterity of Wit together with the helps of other learning which
Iudges in that Court to be their Ministers others of the people annually chosen twice so many in number as they to be Iudges together with them in the same Court These two sorts to have the care of all Mens manners power of determining of all kinde of Ecclesiastical Causes and authority to Convent to Controll to Punish as far as with Excommunication whom soever they should think worthy none either small or great excepted This device I see not how the wisest at that time living could have bettered if we duly consider what the present State of Geneva did then require For their Bishop and his Clergy being as it is said departed from them by Moon-light or howsoever being departed to chuse in his room any other Bishop had been a thing altogether impossible And for their Ministers to seek that themselves alone might have coercive power over the whole Church would perhaps have been hardly construed at that time But when so frank an offer was made that for every one Minister there should be two of the people to sit and give voice in the Ecclesiastical Consistory what inconvenience could they easily finde which themselves might not be able always to remedy Howbeit as ever more the simpler sort are even when they see no apparent cause jealous notwithstanding over the secret intents and purposes of wiser men this Proposition of his did somewhat trouble them Of the Ministers themselves which had staid behinde in the City when Calvin was gone some upon knowledge of the peoples earnest intent to recal him to his place again had beforehand written their Letters of Submission and assured him of their alleâ—giance for ever after if it should like him to hearken unto that Publick Suit But yet misdoubting what might happen if this Discipline did go forward they objected against it the example of other Reformed Churches living quietly and orderly without it Some of the chiefest place and countenance amongst the Laity professed with greater stomach their judgments that such a Discipline was little better then Popish Tyranny disguised and tendered unto them under a new Form This sort it may be had some fear that the filling up of the Seats in the Consistory with so great a member of Laymen was but to please the mindes of the people to the end they might think their own sway somewhat but when things came to tryal of practice their Pastors learning would be at all times of force to over-perswade simple men who knowing the time of their own Presidentship to be but short would always stand in fear of their Ministers perpetual authority And among the Ministers themselves one being so far in estimation above the rest the voices of the rest were likely to be given for the most part respectively with a kinde of secret dependency and aw So that in shew a marvellous indifferently composed Senate Ecclesiastical was to govern but in effect one onely man should as the Spirit and Soul of the residue do all in all But what did these vain surmises boot Brought they were now to so strait an issue that of two things they must chuse one Namely Whether they would to their endless disgrace with ridiculous lightness dismiss him whose restitution they had in so impotent manner desired or else condescend unto that demand wherein he was resolute either to have it or to leave them They thought it better to be somewhat hardly yoked at home then for ever abroad discredited Wherefore in the end those Orders were on all sides assented unto with no less alacrity of minde then Cities unable to hold out longer are wont to shew when they take conditions such as liketh him to offer them which hath them in the narrow streights of advantage Not many years were over passed before these twice-sworn men adventured to give their last and hottest assault to the Fortress of the same Discipline childishly granting by common consent of their whole Senate and that under their Town-Seal a Relaxation to one Bertelier whom the Eldership had Excommunicated Further also decreeing with strange absurdity that to the same Senate it should belong to give final judgment in Matter of Excommunication and to absolve whom it pleased them clean contrary to their own former Deeds and Oaths The report of which Decree being fortwith brought unto Calvin Before saith he this Decree take place either my Blood or Banishment shall sign it Again two days before the Communion should be celebrated this speech was publickly to like effect Kill me if ever this hand do teach forth the things that are holy to them whom the Church hath judged despisers Whereupon for fear of tumult the forenamed Bertelier was by his friends advised for that time not to use the liberty granted him by the Senate nor to present himself in the Church till they saw somewhat further what would ensue After the Communion quietly ministred and some likelihood of peaceable ending of these troubles without any more aâ—â— that very day in the afternoon besides all mens expectation concluding his ordinary Sermon he telleth them That because he neither had learned nor taught to strive with such as are in Authority therefore saith he the case so standing as now it doth let me use these words of the Apostle unto you I commend you unto God and the Word of his Grace and so bad them heartily Adieu It sometimes cometh to pass that the readiest way which a wise man hath to conquer is to flie This voluntary and unexpected mention of sudden departure caused presently the Senate for according to their wonted manner they still continued onely constant in unconstancy to gather themselves together and for a time to suspend their own Decree leaving things to proceed as before till they had heard the judgment of Four Helvetian Cities concerning the matter which was in strife This to have done at the first before they gave assent unto any order had shewed some wit and discretion in them but now to do it was as much as to say in effect That they would play their parts on a stage Calvin therefore dispatcheth with all expedition his Letters unto some Principal Pastor in every of those Cities craving earnestly at their hands to respect this Cause as a thing whereupon the whole State of Religion and Piety in that Church did so much depend That God and all good men were now inevitably certain to be trampled under foot unless those Four Cities by their good means might be brought to give sentence with the Ministers of Geneva when the Cause should be brought before them yea so to give it that two things it might effectually contain The one an Absolute Approbation of the Discipline of Geneva as consonant unto the Word of God without any cautions qualifications ifs or ands the other an earnest Admonition not to innovate or charge the same His vehement request herein as touching both points was satisfied For albeit the said Helvetian Churches did never as yet
higher Callings are ripped up with marvellous exceeding severity and sharpness of Reproof which being oftentimes dont begetteth a great good opinion of Integrity zeal and Holiness to such constant reprovers of sin as by likelihood would never be so much offended at that which is evil unless themselves were singularly good The next thing hereunto is to impute all Faults and Corruptions wherewith the World aboundeth unto the kinde of Ecclesiastical Government established Wherein as before by reproving Faults they purchased unto themselves with the multitude a name to be vertuous so by finding out this kinde of Cause they obtain to be judged wise above others whereas in truth unto the Form even of Iewish Government which the Lord himself they all confess did establish with like shew of Reason they might impute those Faults which the Prophets condemn in the Governors of that Commonwealth as to the English kinde of Regiment Ecclesiastical whereof also God himself though in another sort is Author the stains and blemishes found in our State which springing from the Root of Humane Frailty and Corruption not onely are but have been always more or less yea and for any thing we know to the contrary will be till the Worlds end complained of what Form of Government soever take place Having gotten thus much sway in the hearts of men a third step is to propose their own Form of Church Government as the onely soveraign remedy of all Evils and to adorn it with all the glorious Titles that may be And the Nature as of men that have sick bodies so likewise of the people in the crazedness of their Mindes possest with dislike and discontentment at things present is to imagine that any thing the vertue whereof they hear commended would help them but that most which they least have tryed The fourth degree of Inducements is by fashioning the very notions and conceits of mens mindes in such sort that when they read the Scripture they may think that every thing soundeth towards the advancement of that Discipline and to the utter disgrace of the contrary Pythagoras by bringing up his Schollars in speculative knowledge of numbers made their conceipts therein so strong that when they came to the contemplation of things natural they imagined that in every particular thing they even beheld as it were with their eyes how the Elements of Number gave Essence and Being to the Works of Nature A thing in reason impossible which notwithstanding through their misfashioned preconceit appeared unto them no less certain then if Nature had written it in the very Foreheads of all the Creatures of God When they of the Family of Love have it once in their heads that Christ doth not signifie any one Person but a Quality whereof many are partakers that to be raised is nothing else but to be regenerated or endued with the said quality and that when Separation of them which have if from them which have it not is here made this is judgment How plainly do they imagine that the Scripture every where speaketh in the favor of that Sect And assuredly the very cause which maketh the simple and ignorant to think they even see how the Word of God runneth currantly on your side is That their mindes are forestalled and their conceits perverted beforehand by being taught that an Elder doth signifie a Lay-man admitted onely to the Office of Rule or Government in the Church a Doctor one which may onely Teach and neither Preach nor Administer the Sacraments a Deacon one which hath charge of the Alms-box and of nothing else That the Scepter the Rod the Throne and Kingdom of Christ art a Form of Regiment onely by Pastors Elders Doctors and Deacons that by Mystical Resemblance Mount Sion and Jerusalem are the Churches which admit Samaria and Babylon the Churches which oppugne the said Form of Regiment And in like sort they are taught to apply all things spoken of repairing the Walls and decayed parts of the City and Temple of God by Esdras Nehemias and the rest As if purposely the Holy Ghost had therein meant to fore-signifie what the Authors of Admonitions to the Parliament of Supplications to the Council of Petitions to Her Majesty and of such other-like Writs should either do or suffer in behalf of this their Cause From hence they proceed to an higher point which is the perswading of men credulous and over-capable of such pleasing Errors That it is the special illumination of the Holy Ghost whereby they discern those things in the Word which others reading yet discern them not Dearly Beloved saith St. John Give not credit unto every spirit There are but two ways whereby the Spirit leadeth men into all Truth the one extraordinary the other common the one belonging but unto some few the other extending it self unto all that are of God the one that which we call by a special divine excellency Revelation the other Reason If the Spirit by such Revelation have discovered unto them the secrets of that Discipline out of Scripture they must profess themselves to be all even Men Women and Children Prophets Or if Reason be the hand which the Spirit hath led them by for as much as Perswasions grounded upon Reason are either weaker or stronger according to the force of those Reasons whereupon the same are grounded they must every of them from the greatest to the least be able for every several Article to shew some special Reason as strong as their Perswasion therein is earnest Otherwise how can it be but that some other sinews there are from which that everplus of strength in Perswasion doth arise Most sure it is That when Mens Affections do frame their Opinions they are in defence of Error more earnest a great deal then for the most part sound Believers in the maintenance of Truth apprehended according to the nature of that evidence which Scripture yieldeth Which being in some things plain as in the Principles of Christian Doctrine in some things as in these Matters of Discipline more dark and doubtful frameth correspondently that inward assent which Gods most gracious Spirit worketh by it as by his Effectual Instrument It is not therefore the servent earnestness of their perswasion but the soundness of those Reasons whereupon the same is built which must declare their Opinions in these things to have been wrought by the Holy Ghost and not by the Fraud of that evil spirit which is even in his illusions strong After that the fancy of the common sort hath once thorowly apprehended the Spirit to be Author of their Perswasions concerning Discipline then is instilled into their hearts that the same Spirit leading men into this opinion doth thereby seal them to be Gods Children and that as the state of the times now standeth the most special taken to know them that are Gods own from others is an earnest affection that way This hath bred high terms of Separation between such and the rest of the
in this case ye are all bound for the time to suspend and in otherwise doing ye offend against God by troubling his Church without any just or necessary cause Be it that there are some reasons inducing you to think hardly of our Laws Are those reasons demonstrative are they necessary or but meer probabilities onely An Argument necessary and demonstrative is such as being proposed unto any man and understood she minde cannot chase but invardly assent Any one such reason dischargeth I grant the Gonscience and setteth it at full liberty For the publick approbation given by the Body of this whole Church unto those things which are established doth make it but probable that they are good And therefore unto a necessary proofe that they are not good it must give place But if the skilfullest amongst you can shew that all the Books ye have hitherto written be able to afford any one argument of this nature let the instance be given As for probabilities What thing was there ever set down so agreeable with sound reason but some probable shew against it might be made It is meet that when publickly things are received and have taken place General Obedience thereunto should cease to be exacted in case this or that private person led with some probable conceit should make open Protostation Peter or John disallow them and pronounce them naught In which case your answer will be That concerning the Laws of our Church they are not onely condemned in the opinion of a private man but of thousands year and even of those amongst which divers are in publick charge and authority At though when publick consent of the whole hath established any thing every mans judgment being thereunto compared were not private howsoever his calling be to some kinde of publick charge So that of Peace and Quietness there is not any way possible unless the probable voice of every intire Society or Body Politick over-rule all private of like nature in the same Body Which thing effectually proveth That God being Author of Peace and not of Confusion in the Church must needs be Author of those mens peaceable resolutions who concerning these things have determined with themselves to think and do as the Church they are of decreeth till they see necessary cause enforcing them to the contrary 7. Nor is mine own intent any other in these several Books of discourse then to make it appear unto you that for the Ecclesiastical Laws of this Land we are led by great reason to observe them and ye by no necessity bound to impugne them It is no part of my secret meaning to draw you hereby into hatred or to set upon the face of this cause any fairer gloss then the naked truth doth afford but my whole endeavor is to resolve the Conscience and to shew as near as I can what in this Controversie the Heart is to think if it will follow the light of sound and sincere judgment without either cloud of prejudice or mist of passionate affection Wherefore seeing that Laws and Ordinances in particular whether such as we observe or such as your selves would have established when the minde doth sift and examine them it must needs have often recourse to a number of doubts and questions about the nature kindes and qualities of Laws in general whereof unless it be throughly informed there will appear no certainty to stay our perswasion upon I have for that cause set down in the first place an Introduction on both sides needful to be considered declaring therein what Law is how different kindes of Laws there are and what force they are of according unto each kinde This done because ye suppose the Laws for which ye strive are found in Scripture but those not against which we strive And upon this surmise are drawn to hold it as the very main Pillar of your whole cause That Scripture ought to be the onely rule of all our actions and consequently that the Church Orders which we observe being not commanded in Scripture are offensive and displeasant unto God I have spent the second Book in sifting of this point which standeth with you for the first and chiefest principle whereon ye build Whereunto the next in degree is That as God will have always a Church upon Earth while the World doth continue and that Church stand in need of Government of which Government it behoveth himself to be both the Author and Teacher So it cannot stand with duty That man should ever presume in any wise to change and alter the same and therefore That in Scripture there must of necessity be found some particular Form of Ecclesiastical Polity the Laws whereof admit not any kinde of alteration The first three Books being thus ended the fourth proceedeth from the general Grounds and Foundations of your cause unto your general Accusations against us as having in the orders of our Church for so you pretend Corrupted the right Form of Church Polity with manifold Popish Rites and Ceremonies which certain Reformed Churches have banished from amongst them and have thereby given us such example as you think we ought to follow This your Assertion hath herein drawn us to make search whether these be just Exceptions against the Customs of our Church when ye plead that they are the same which the Church of Rome hath or that they are not the same which some other Reformed Churches have devised Of those four Books which remain and are bestowed about the Specialties of that Cause which little in Controversie the first examineth the causes by you alledged wherefore the publick duties of Christian Religion as our Prayers our Sacraments and the rest should not be ordered in such sort as with us they are nor that power whereby the persons of men are consecrated unto the Ministry be disposed of in such manner as the Laws of this Church do allow The second and third are concerning the power of Iurisdiction the one Whether Laymen such as your Governing Elders are ought in all Congregations for ever to be invested with that power The other Whether Bishops may have that power over other Pastors and therewithal that honor which with us they have And because besides the Power of Order which all consecrated persons have and the Power of Iurisdiction which neither they all nor they onely have There is a third power a Power of Ecclesiastical Dominion communicable as we think unto persons not Ecclesiastical and most fit to be restrained unto the Prince our Soveraign Commander over the whole Body Politick The eighth Book we have allotted unto this Question and have sifted therein your Objections against those preeminences Royal which thereunto appertain Thus have I laid before you the Brief of these my Travels and presented under your view the Limbs of that Cause litigious between us the whole intire Body whereof being thus compact it shall be no troublesome thing for any man to finde each particular Controversies resting place
hast made me wiser then mine enemies Again I have had more understanding then all my Teachers because thy Testimonies are my Meditations What pains would not they have bestowed in the study of these Books who travelled Sea and Land to gain the treasure of some few days talk with men whose wisdom the World did make any reckoning of That little which some of the Heathens did chance to hear concerning such matter as the Sacred Scripture plentifully containeth they did in wonderful sort affect their speeches as oft as they make mention thereof are strange and such as themselves could not utter as they did other things But still acknowledged that their wits which did every where else conquer hardness were with profoundness here over-matched Wherefore seeing that God hath endued us with Sense to the end that we might perceive such things as this present life doth need and with reason left that which Sense cannot reach unto being both now and also in regard of a future estate hereafter necessary to be known should lie obscure Finally with the Heavenly support of Prophetical Revelation which doth open those hidden Mysteries that Reason could never have been able to finde out or to have known the necessity of them unto our everlasting good Use we the precious gifts of God unto his glory and honor that gave them seeking by all means to know what the Will of our God is what righteous before him in his sight what holy perfect and good that we may truly and faithfully do it 16. Thus far therefore we have endeavored in part to open of what nature and force Laws are according unto their several kindes The Law which God with himself hath eternally set down to follow in his own works The Law which he hath made for his Creatures to keep The Law of natural and necessary Agents The Law which Angels in Heaven obey The Law whereunto by the Light of Reason Men finde themselves bound in that they are Men The Law which they make by composition for Multitudes and Politick Societies of Men to be guided by The Law which belongeth unto each Nation The Law that concerneth the Fellowship of all And lastly The Law which God himself hath supernaturally revealed It might peradventure have been more popular and more plausible to vulgar ears if this first discourse had been spent in extolling the force of Laws in shewing the great necessity of them when they are good and in aggravating their offence by whom Publick Laws are injuriously traduced But for as much as with such kinde of matter the Passions of Men are rather stirred one way or other then their knowledge any way set forward unto the tryal of that whereof there is doubt made I have therefore turned aside from that beaten path and chosen though a less easie yet a more profitable way in regard of the end we propose Lest therefore any man should marvel whereunto all these things tendâ— the drift and purpose of all is this even to shew in what manner as every good and perfect gift so this very gift of good and perfect Laws is derived from the Father of Lights to teach men a reason why just and reasonable Laws are of so great force of so great use in the World and to inform their mâ—ndes with some method of reducing the Laws whereof there is present controversie unto their first original causes that so it may be in every particular Ordinance thereby the better discerned whether the same be reasonable just and righteous or no. Is there any thing which can either be thorowly understood or soundly judged of till the very first causes and principles from which originally it springeth be made manifest If all parts of knowledge have been thought by wise men to be then most orderly delivered and proceeded in when they are drawn to their first original seeing that our whole question concerneth the quality of Ecclesiastical Laws let it not seem a labor superfluous that in the entrance thereunto all these several kindes of Laws have been considered in as much as they all concur as principles they all have their forcible operations therein although not all in like aprent and manifest manner By means whereof it cometh to pass that the force which they have is not observed of many Easier a great deal it is for Men by Law to be taught what they ought to do then instructed how to judge as they should do of Law the one being a thing which belongeth generally unto all the other such as none but the wiser and more judicious sort can perform Yea the wisest are always touching this point the readiest to acknowledge that soundly to judge of a Law is the weightiest thing which any man can take upon him But if we will give judgment of the Laws under which we live first let that Law Eternal be always before our eyes as being of principal force and moment to breed in religious mindes a dutiful estimation of all Laws the use and benefit whereof we see because there can be no doubt but that Laws apparently good are as it were things copied out of the very Tables of that High Everlasting Law even as the Book of that Law hath said concerning it self By me Kings reign and by me Princes decree Iustice. Not as if Men did behold that Book and accordingly frame their Laws but because it worketh in them because it discovereth and as it were readeth it self to the World by them when the Laws which they make are righteous Furthermore although we perceive not the goodness of Laws made nevertheless sith things in themselves may have that which we peradventure discern not Should not this breed a fear into our hearts how we speak or judge in the worse part concerning that the unadvised disgrace whereof may be no mean dishonor to him towards whom we profess all submission and aw Surely there must be very manifest iniquity in Laws against which we shall be able to justifie our contumelious Invectives The chiefest root whereof when we use them without cause is ignorance how Laws inferior are derived from that supream or highest Law The first that receive impression from thence are Natural agents The Law of whose operations might be haply thought less pertinent when the question is about Laws for Humane actions but that in those very actions which most spiritually and supernaturally concern men the Rules and Axioms of Natural operations have their force What can be more immediate to our Salvation then our perswasion concerning the Law of Christ towards his Church What greater assurance of love towards his Church then the knowledge of that Mystical Union whereby the Church is become as near unto Christ as any one part of his flesh is unto other That the Church being in such sort his he must needs protect it what proof more strong then if a manifest Law so require which Law it is not possible for
Christ to violate And what other Law doth the Apostle for this alledge but such as is both common unto Christ with us and unto us with other things Natural No man hateth his own flesh but doth love and cherish it The Axioms of that Law therefore whereby Natural agents are guided have their use in the Moral yea even in the Spiritual actions of men and consequently in all Laws belonging unto men howsoever Neither are the Angels themselves so far severed from us in their kinde and manner of working but that between the Law of their Heavenly operations and the Actions of men in this our state of mortality such correspondence there is as maketh it expedient to know in some sort the one for the others more perfect direction Would Angels acknowledge themselves Fellow-servants with the Sons of Men but that both having One Lord there must be some kinde of Law which is one and the same to both whereunto their obedience being perfecter is to our weaker both a Pattern and a Spur Or would the Apostles speaking of that which belongeth unto Saints as they are linked together in the Bond of Spiritual Society so often make mention how Angels are therewith delighted if in things publickly done by the Church we are not somewhat to respect what the Angels of Heaven do Yea so far hath the Apostle St. Paul proceeded as to signifie that even about the outward Orders of the Church which serve but for comeliness some regard is to be had of Angels who best like us when we are most like unto them in all parts of decent demeanor So that the Law of Angels we cannot judge altogether impertinent unto the affairs of the Church of God Our largeness of speech how men do finde out what things Reason bindeth them of necessity to observe and what it guideth them to chuse in things which are left as Arbitary the care we have had to declare the different Nature of Laws which severally concern all men from such as belong unto men either civilly or spiritually associated such as pertain to the Fellowship which Nations or which Christian Nations have amongst themselves and in the last place such as concerning every or any of these God himself hath revealed by his holy Word all serveth but to make manifest that as the Actions of men are of sundry distinct kindes so the Laws thereof must accordingly be distinguished There are in men operations some Natural some Rational some Supernatural some Politick some finally Ecclesiastical Which if we measure not each by his own proper Law whereas the things themselves are so different there will be in our understanding and judgment of them confusion As that first Error sheweth whereon our opposites in this cause have grounded themselves For as they rightly maintain that God must be glorified in all things and that the actions of men cannot tend unto his glory unless they be framed after his Law So it is their Error to think that the onely Law which God hath appointed unto men in that behalf is the Sacred Scripture By that which we work naturally as when we breath sleep move we set forth the glory of God as Natural agents do albeit we have no express purpose to make that our end nor any advised determination therein to follow a Law but do that we do for the most part not as much as thinking thereon In reasonable and Moral actions another Law taketh place a Law by the observation whereof we glorifie God in such sort as no Creature else under Man is able to do because other Creatures have not judgment to examine the quality of that which is done by them and therefore in that they do they neither can accuse not approve themselves Men do both as the Apostle teacheth yea those men which have no written Law of God to shew what is good or evil carry written in their hearts the Universal Law of Mankinde the Law of Reason whereby they judge as by a Rule which God hath given unto all Men for that purpose The Law of Reason doth somewhat direct Men how to honor God as their Creator but how to glorifie God in such sort as is required to the end he may be an Everlasting Saviour this we are taught by Divine Law which Law both ascertaineth the truth and supplieth unto us the want of that other Law So that in Moral actions Divine Law helpeth exceedingly the Law of Reason to guide Mans life but in Supernatural it alone guideth Proceed we further Let us place Man in some Publick Society with others whether Civil or Spiritual and in this case there is no remedy but we must add yet a further Law For although even here likewise the Laws of Nature and Reason be of necessary use yet somewhat over and besides them is necessary namely Humane and Positive Law together with that Law which is of commerce between Grand Societies the Law of Nations and of Nations Christian. For which cause the Law of God hath likewise said Let every Soul be subject to the higher Powers The Publick Power of all Societies is above every Soul contained in the same Societies And the principal use of that Power is to give Laws unto all that are under it which Laws in such case we must obey unless there be reason shewed which may necessarily inforce That the Law of Reason or of God doth enjoyn the contrary Because except our own private and but probable resolutions be by the Law of Publick Determinations over-ruled we take away all possibility of sociable life in the World A plainer example whereof then our selves we cannot have How cometh it to pass that we are at this present day so rent with mutual contentions and that the Church is so much troubled about the Polity of the Church No doubt if men had been willing to learn how many Laws their actions in this life are subject unto and what the true force of each Law is all these controversies might have died the very day they were first brought forth It is both commonly said and truly That the best men otherwise are not always the best in regard of Society The reason whereof is for that the Law of Mens actions is one if they be respected onely as Men and another when they are considered as parts of a Politick Body Many men there are then whom nothing is more commendable when they are singled And yet in Society with others none less fit to answer the duties which are looked for at their hands Yea I am perswaded that of them with whom in this cause we strive there are whose betters among men would be hardly found if they did not live amongst men but in some Wilderness by themselves The cause of which their disposition so unframable unto Societies wherein their live is for that they discern not aright what place and force these several kindes of Laws ought to have in all their
that in truth they never meant any otherwise to tie the one then the other unto Scripture both being thereunto equally tied as far as each is required in the same kinde of necessity unto Salvation If therefore it be not unlawful to know and with full perswasion to believe much more then Scripture alone doth teach if it be against all Sense and Reason to condemn the knowledge of so many Arts and Sciences as are otherwise learned then in Holy Scripture notwithstanding the manifest Speeches of ancient Catholick Fathers which seem to close up within the bosom thereof all manner good and lawful knowledge wheresore should their words be thought more effectual to shew that we may not in deeds and practice then they are to prove that in speculation and knowledge we ought not to go any further then the Scripture Which Scripture being given to teach matters of belief no less then of action the Fathers must needs be and are even as plain against credit besides the relation as against practice without the injunction of the Scripture S. Augustine hath said Whether it be question of Christ or whether it be question of his Church or of what thing soever the question be I say not if we but if an Angel from Heaven shall tell us any thing beside that you have received in the Scripture under the Law and the Gospel let him be accursed In like sort Tertallian We may not give our selves this liberty to bring in any thing of our will nor chuse any thing that other men bring in of their will we have the Apostles themselves for Authors which themselves brought nothing of their own will but the Discipline which they received of Christ they delivered faithfully unto the people in which place the name of Discipline importeth not as they who alledge it would fain have it construed but as any man who noteth the circumstance of the place and the occasion of uttering the words will easily acknowledge even the self-same thing it signifieth which the name of Doctrine doth and as well might the one as the other there have been used To help them farther doth not S. Ierome after the self-same manner dispute We believe it not because we read it not yea We ought not so much as to know the things which the Book of the Law containeth not saith S. Hilary Shall we hereupon then conclude that we may not take knowledge of or give credit unto any thing which sense or experience or report or art doth propose unless we finde the same in Scripture No it is too plain that so far to extend their Speeches is to wrest them against their true intent and meaning To urge any thing upon the Church requiring thereunto that Religious Assent of Christian Belief wherewith the words of the Holy Prophets are received to urge any thing as part of that supernatural and celestially revealed Truth which God hath taught and not to shew it in Scripture this did the ancient Fathers evermore think unlawful impious execrable And thus as their Speeches were meant so by us they must be restrained As for those alledged words of Cyprian The Christian Religion shall finde that out of this Scripture Rules of all Doctrines have sprung and that from hence doth spring and hither doth return whatsoever the Ecclesiastical Discipline doth contain Surely this place would never have been brought forth in this cause if it had been but once read over in the Author himself out of whom it is cited For the words are uttered concerning that one principal Commandment of Love in the honour whereof hespeaketh after this sort Surely this Commandment containeth the Law and the Prophets and in this one Word is the Abridgement of all the Volumes of Scripture This Nature and Reason and the authority of thy Word O Lord doth proclaim this we have heard out of thy month herein the perfection of all Religion doth consist This is the first Commandment and the last This being written in the Book of Life is as it were an everlasting lesson both to Men and Angels Let Christian Religion read this one Word and meditate upon this Commandment and out of this Scriptrue it shall finde the Rules of all Learning to have spring and from hence to have risen and hither to return whatsoever the Ecclesiastical Discipline containeth and that in all things it is vain and bootless which Charity confirmeth not Was this a sentence trow you of so great force to prove that Scripture is the onely Rule of all the actions of men Might they not hereby even as well prove that one Commandment of Scripture is the onely rule of all things and so exclude the rest of the Scripture as now they do all means besides Scripture But thus it fareth when too much desire of contradiction causeth our speech rather to pass by number then to stay for weight Well but Tertullian doth in this case speak yet more plainly The Scripture saith he denieth what it noteth not which are indeed the words of Tertullian But what the Scripture reckoneth up the Kings of Israel and amongst those Kings David the Scripture reckoneth up the sons of David and amongst those sons Solomon To prove that amongst the Kings of Israel there was no David but only one no Solomon but one in the sons of David Tertullians Argument will fitly prove For inasmuch as the Scripture did propose to reckon up all if there were moe it would haue named them In this case the Scripture doth deny the thing it noteth not Howbeit I could not but think that man to do me some piece of manifest injury which would hereby fasten upon me a general Opinion as if I did think the Scripture to deny the very Reign of King Henry the Eighth because it no where noteth that any such King did reign Tertullians speech is probable concerning such matter as he there speaketh of There was saith Tertullian no second Lamech like to him that had two wives the Scripture denieth what it noteth not As therefore it noteth one such to have been in that Age of the World so had there been moe it would by likelihood as well have noted many as one What infer we now hereupon There was no second Lamech the Scripture denieth what it noteth not Were it consonant unto reason to divorce these two Sentences the former of which doth shew how the latter is retrained and not marking the former to conclude by the latter of them that simply whatsoever any man at this day doth think true is by the Scripture denied unless it be there affirmed to be true I wonder that a case so weak and feeble hath been so much persisted in But to come unto those their Sentences wherein matters of action are more apparently touched the Name of Tertullian is as before so here again pretended who writing unto his Wife two Books and exhorting her in the one to live a Widow
telleth them that if they did suffer notorious Maleâ—actors to come to the Table of our Lord and not put them by it would be as heavily revenged upon them as if themselves had shed his Blood that for this purpose God had called them to the rooms which they held in the Church of Christ that this they should reckon was their Dignity this their Safety this their whole Crown and Glory and therefore this they should carefully intend and not when the Sacrament is administred imagine themselves called only to walk up and down in a White and shining Garment Now whereas these speeches of Ierome and Chrysostom do seem plainly to allude unto such Ministerial Garments as were then in use To this they answer that by Ierom nothing can be gathered but only that the Ministers came to Church in handsome Holy-day apparel and that himself did not think them bound by the Law of God no go like Slovens but the Weed which we mean he defendeth not That Chrysostome meaneth the same which we defend but seemeth rather to reprehend than allow it as we do Which Answer wringeth out of Ierome and Chrysostome that which their words will not gladly yield They both speak of the same Persons namely the Clergy and of their Weed at the same time when they administer the blessed Sacrament and of the self-same kinde of Weed a white Garment so far as we have wit to conceive and for any thing we are able to see their manner of speech is not such as doth argue either the thing it self to be different whereof they speak or their Judgment concerning it different although the one do only maintain it against Pelagius as a thing not therefore unlawful because it was fair or handsom and the other make it a matter of small commendation in it self if they which wear it do nothing else but weare the Robes which their Place requireth The honesty dignity and estimation of White Apparel in the Eastern part of the World is a token of greater fitness for this sacred use wherein it were not convenient that any thing basely thought of should be suffered Notwithstanding I am not bent to stand stiffely upon these Probabilities that in Ierom's and Chrysostom's time any such Attire was made several to this purpose Yet surely the words of Solomon are very impertinent to prove it an Ornament therefore not several for the Ministers to execute their Ministry in because men of credit and estimation wore their ordinary Apparel white For we know that when Solomon wrote those words the several Apparel for the Ministers of the Law to execute their Ministry in was such The Wise man which seared God from his heart and honoured the Service that was done unto him could not mention so much as the Garment of Holiness but with effectual signification of most singular reverence and love Were it not better that the love which men bear to God should make the least things which are imployed in his Service amiable than that their over-scrupulous dislike of so mean a thing as a Vestment should from the very Service of God with-draw their hearts and affections I term it rather a mean thing a thing not much to be respected because even they so account now of it whose first Disputations against it were such as if Religion had scarcely any thing of greater waight Their Allegations were then That if a man were assured to gain a thousand by doing that which may offend any one Brother or be unto him a cause of falling he ought not to do it That this Popish Apparel the Surplice especially hath been by Papists abominably abused That it hath been a mark and a very Sacrament of Abomination That remaining it serveth as a Monument of Idolatry and not only edifieth not but as a dangerous and scandalous Ceremony doth exceeding much harm to them of whose good we are commanded to have regard that it causeth men to perish and make shipwrack of Conscience for so themselves profess they mean when they say the weak are offended herewith that it hardneth Papists hindreth the weak from profiting in the knowledge of the Gospel grieveth godly mindes and giveth them occasion to think hardly of their Ministers that if the Magistrates may command or the Church appoint Rites and Ceremonies yet seeing our abstinence from things in their own nature indifferent if the weak Brother should be offended is a flat Commandement of the Holy Ghost which no Authority either of Church or Common-wealth can make void therefore neither may the one nor the other lawfully ordain this Ceremony which hath great incommodity and no profit great offence and no edifying That by the Law it should have been burnt and consumed with fire as a thing infected with Leprosie That the Example of Ezekiah beating to powder the Brazen Serpent and of Paul abrogating those abused Feasts of Charity inforceth upon us the duty of abolishing altogether a thing which hath been and is so offensive Finally That God by his Prophet hath given an express Commandement which in this case toucheth us no less than of old it did the Jews ' Ye shall pollute the covering of the Images of Silver and the rich ornament of your Images of Gold and cast them away as a stained ragg thou shalt say unto it Get thee hence These and such like were their first Discourses touching that Church-Attire which with us for the most part is usual in Publick Prayer our Ecclesiastical Laws so appointing as well because it hath been of reasonable continuance and by special choice was taken out of the number of those holy Garments which over and besides their mystical reference served for comeliness under the Law and is in the number of those Ceremonies which may with choice and discretion be used to that purpose in the Church of Christ as also for that it suiteth so fitly with that lightsom affection of joy wherein God delighteth when his Saints praise him and so lively resembleth the glory of the Saints in Heaven together with the beauty wherein Angels have appeared unto men that they which are to appear for men in the presence of God as Angels if they were left to their own choice and would chuse any could not easily devise a Garment of more decency for such a Service As for those fore-rehearsed vehement allegations against it shall we give them credit when the very Authors from whom they came confess they believe not their own sayings For when once they began to perceive how many both of them in the two Universities and of others who abroad having Ecclesiastical charge do favour mightily their Cause and by all means set it forward might by persisting in the extremity of that Opinion hazard greatly their own Estates and so weaken that part which their Places do now give them much opportunity to strengthen they asked counsel as it seemed from some abroad who
referring the name of a Title especially to the maintenance of the Minister infringe all Ordinations made except they which receive Orders be first intituled to a competent Ecclesiastical Benefice and which is most ridiculously strange except besides their present Title to some such Benefice they have likewise some other Title of Annual Rent or Pension whereby they may he relieved in case through infirmity sickness or other lawful impediment they grow unable to execute their Ecclesiastical Function So that every man lawfully ordained must bring a Bow which hath two strings a Title of present Right and another to provide for future possibility or chance Into these absurdities and follies they slide by mis-conceiving the true purpose of certain Canons which indeed have forbidden to ordain a Minister without a Title not that simply it is unlawful so to ordain but because it might grow to an inconvenience if the Church did not somewhat restrain that liberty For seeing they which have once received Ordination cannot again return into the World it behoveth them which Ordain to fore-see how such shall be afterwards able to live lest their poverty and destitution should redound to the disgrace and discredit of their Calling Which evil prevented those very Lawes which in that respect forbid doe expresly admit Ordinations to be made at large and without Title namely if the Party so ordained have of his own for the sustenance of this life or if the Bishop which giveth him Orders will finde him competent allowance till some place of Ministration from whence his maintenance may arise be provided for him or if any other fit and sufficient means be had against the danger before mentioned Absolutely therefore it is not true that any antient Canon of the Church which is or ought to be with us in force doth make Ordinations at large unlawful and as the state of the Church doth stand they are most necessary If there be any conscience in men â—ouching that which they write or speak let them consider as well what the present condition of all things doth now suffer as what the Ordinances of former Ages did appoint as well the weight of those Causes for which our Affairs have altered as the reasons in regard whereof our Fathers and Predecessours did sometime strictly and severely keep that which for us to observe now is neither meet nor alwayes possible In this our present Cause and Controversie whether any not having Title of Right to a Benefice may be lawfully ordained a Minister is it not manifest in the eyes of all men that whereas the name of a Benefice doth signifie some standing Ecclesiastical Revenue taken out of the Treasure of God and allotted to a Spiritual Person to the end he may use the same and enjoy it as his own for term of life unless his default cause Deprivation The Clergy for many years after Christ had no other Benefices but onely their Canonical Portions or monethly Dividends allowed them according to their several degrees and qualities out of the Common Stock of such Gifts Oblations and Tythes as the servour of Christian Piety did then yield Yea that even when Ministers had their Churches and Flocks assigned unto them in several yet for maintenance of life their former kinde of allowance continued till such time as Bishops and Churches Cathedral being sufficiently endowed with Lands other Presbyters enjoyed in stead of their first Benefices the Tythes and Profits of their own Congregations whole to themselves Is it not manifest that in this Realm and so in other the like Dominions where the tenure of Lands is altogether grounded on Military Laws and held as in Fee under Princes which are not made Heads of the People by force of voluntary Election but born the Soveraign Lords of those whole and intire Territories which Territories their famous Progenitours obtaining by way of Conquest retained what they would in their own hands and divided the rest to others with reservation of Soveraignty and Capital Interest the building of Churches and consequently the assigning of either Parishes or Benefices was a thing impossible without consent of such as were principal Owners of Land in which consideration for their more encouragement hereunto they which did so farr benefit the Church had by common consent granted as great equity and reason was a right for them and their Heirs till the Worlds end to nominate in those Benefices men whose quality the Bishop allowing might admit them thereunto Is it not manifest that from hence inevitably such inequality of Parishes hath grown as causeth some through the multitude of people which have refort unto one Church to be more than any one man can welld and some to be of that nature by reason of Chappels annex'd that they which are Incumbents should wrong the Church if so be they had not certain Stipendaries under them because where the Crops of the Profit or Benefice is but one the Title can be but one man 's and yet the charge may require more Not to mention therefore any other reason whereby it may clearly appear how expedient it is and profitable for this Church to admit Ordinations without Title this little may suffice to declare how impertinent their allegations against it are out of antient Canons how untrue their confident asseverations that onely through negligence of Popish Prelates the custom of making such kinde of Ministers hath prevailed in the Church of Rome against their Canons and that with us it is expresly against the Laws of our own Government when a Minister doth serve as a Stipendary Curate which kinde of Service neverthelesse the greatest Rabbins of that part doe altogether follow For howsoever they are loath peradventure to be named Curates Stipendaries they are and the labour they bestow is in other mens Cures a thing not unlawfull for them to doe yet unseemly for them to condemn which practise it I might here discover the like over-sight throughout all their Discourses made in behalf of the Peoples pretended right to elect their Ministers before the Bishop may lawfully ordain But because we have otherwhere at large disputed of popular Elections and of the right of Patronage wherein is drowned whatsoever the people under any pretence of colour may seem to challenge about Admission and Choyce of the Pastours that shall feed their Souls I cannot see what one Duty there is which alwayes ought to goe before Ordination but onely care of the Partie's worthinesse as well for integrity and vertue as knowledge yea for vertue more in as much as defect of knowledge may sundry wayes be supplyed but the scandal of vicious and wicked life is a deadly evil 81. The truth is that of all things hitherto mentioned the greatest is that threefold blott or blemish of notable ignorance unconscionable absence from the Cures whereof men have taken charge and unsatiable hunting after Spiritual preferments without either care or conscience of the publick good Whereof to the end
so great unto them whose deserts are very mean that nothing doth seem more strange than the one sort because they are not accounted of and the other because they are it being every man's hope and expectation in the Church of God especially that the onely purchace of greater rewards should be alwayes greater deserts and that nothing should ever be able to plant a Thorn where a Vine ought to grow Fourthly that honourable Personages and they who by vertue of any principal Office in the Common-wealth are inabled to qualifie a certain number and make them capable of favours or Faculties above others suffer not their names to be abused contrary to the true intent and meaning of wholsom Laws by men in whom there is nothing notable besides Covetousness and Ambition Fifthly that the graver and wiser sort in both Universities or whosoever they be with whose approbation the marks and recognizances of all Learning are bestowed would think the Apostle's caution against unadvised Ordinations not impertinent or unnecessary to be born in minde even when they grant those degrees of Schools which degrees are not gratia gratis data kindnesses bestowed by way of humanity but they are gratiae gratum sacientes favours which always imply a testimony given to the Church and Common-wealth concerning mens sufficiency for manners and knowledge a testimony upon the credit whereof sundry Statutes of the Realm are built a testimony so far available that nothing is more respected for the warrant of divers mens abilitie to serve in the affairs of the Realm a testimony wherein if they violate that Religion wherewith it ought to be always given and thereby do induce into errour such as deem it a thing uncivil to call the credit thereof in question let them look that God shall return back upon their heads and cause them in the state of their own Corporations to feel either one way or other the punishment of those harms which the Church through their negligence doth sustain in that behalf Finally and to conclude that they who enjoy the benefit of any special Indulgence or Favour which the Laws permit would as well remember what in duty towards the Church and in conscience towards God they ought to do as what they may do by using of their own advantage whatsoever they see tolerated no man being ignorant that the cause why absence in some cases hath been yielded unto and in equity thought sufferable is the hope of greater fruit through industry elsewhere the reason likewise wherefore pluralities are allowed unto men of note a very soveraign and special care that as Fathers in the antient World did declare the preheminence of priority in birth by doubling the worldly portions of their first-born so the Church by a course not unlike in assigning mens rewards might testifie an estimation had proportionably of their Vertues according to the antient Rule Apostolick They which excel in labour ought to excel in honour and therefore unless they answer faithfully the expectation of the Church herein unless sincerely they bend their wits day and night both to sow because they reap and to sow so much more abundantly as they reap more abundantly than other men whereunto by their very acceptance of such benignities they formally binde themselves let them be well assured that the honey which they eat with fraud shall turn in the end into true gall for as much as Laws are the sacred Image of his wisedom who most severely punisheth those colourable and subtile crimes that seldome are taken within the walk of human Justice I therefore conclude that the grounds and maxims of Common right whereupon Ordinations of Ministers unable to Preach tolerations of absence from their Cures and the multiplications of their Spiritual Livings are disproved do but indefinitely enforce them unlawful not unlawful universally and without exception that the Laws which indefinitely are against all these things and the Priviledges which make for them in certain cases are not the one repugnant to the other that the Laws of God and Nature are violated through the effects of abused Priviledges that neither our Ordinations of men unable to make Sermons nor our dispensations for the rest can be justly proved frustrate by vertue of any such surmised opposition between the special Laws of this Church which have permitted and those general which are alledged to disprove the same that when Priviledges by abuse are grown in commodious there must be redress that for remedy of such evils there is no necessity the Church should abrogate either in whole or in part the specialties before mentioned and that the most to be desired were a voluntary reformation thereof on all hands which may give passage unto any abuse OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity BOOK VI. Containing their Fifth Assertion That our Laws are Corrupt and Repugnant to the Laws of God in matter belonging to the Power of Ecclesiastical Iurisdiction in that we have not throughout all Churches certain Lay-Elders established for the Exercise of that Power THE same Men which in heat of Contention do hardly either speak or give ear to reason being after sharp and bitter conflicts retired to a calm remembrance of all their former proceedings the causes that brought them into quarrel the course which their striving affections have followed and the issue whereunto they are come may peradventure as troubled waâ—eâ—s in small time of their own accord by certain easie degrees settle themselves again and so recover that clearness of well advised judgment whereby they shall stand at the length indifferent both to yeild and admit any reasonable satisfaction where before they could not endure with patience to be gain-said Neither will I despair of the like success in these unpleasant Controversies touching Ecclesiastical Polity the time of silence which both parts have willingly taken to breathe seeming now as it were a pledge of all Mens quiet Contentment to hear with more indifferency the weightiest and last remains of that Cause Jurisdiction Dignity Dominion Ecclesiastical For let any Man imagin that the bare and naked difference of a few Ceremonies could either have kindled so much fire or have caused it to flame so long but that the parties which herein laboured mightily for change and as they say for Reformation had somewhat more then this mark whereat to aim Having therefore drawn out a compleat Form as they suppose of publick service to be done to God and set down their Plot for the Office of the Ministry in that behalf they very well knew how little their labours so far forth bestowed would avail them in the end without a claim of Jurisdiction to uphold the Fabrick which they had erected and this neither likely to be obtained but by the strong hand of the people not the people unlikely to favour it the more if overture were made of their own Interest right and title thereunto Whereupon there are many which have conjectured this to be the cause
why in all the projects of their Discipline it being manifest that their drift is to wrest the Key of Spiritual Authority out of the hands of former Governours and equally to possess therewith the Pastors of all several Congregations the people first for surer accomplishment and then for better defence thereof are pretended necessary Actors in those things whereunto their ability for the most part is as slender as their title and challenge unjust Notwithstanding whether they saw it necessary for them to perswade the people without whose help they could do nothing or else which I rather think the affection which they bear towards this new Form of Government made them to imagin it Gods own Ordinance Their Doctrine is that by the Law of God there must be for ever in all Congregations certain Lay-Elders Ministers of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction in as much as our Lord and Saviour by Testament for so they presume hath left all Ministers or Pastors in the Church Executors equally to the whole power of Spiritual Jurisdiction and with them hath joyned the people as Colleagues By maintenance of which Assertion there is unto that part apparently gained a twofold advantage both because the people in this respect are much more easily drawn to favour it as a matter of their own interest and for that if they chance to be crossed by such as oppose against them the colour of Divine Authority assumed for the Grace and Countenance of that Power in the vulgar sort furnisheth their Leaders with great abundance of matter behoveful of their encouragement to proceed alwaies with hope of fortunate success in the end considering their cause to be as David's was a just defence of power given them from above and consequently their Adversaries quarrel the same with Saul's by whom the Ordinance of God was withstood Now on the contrary side if this their surmise prove false if such as in Justification whereof no evidence sufficient either hath been or can be alledged as I hope it shall clearly appear after due examination and trial let them then consider whether those words of Corah Dathan and Abiram against Moses and against Aaron It is too much that ye take upon you seeing all the Congregation is holy be not the very true Abstract and abridgment of all their published Admonitions Demonstrations Supplications and Treatises whatsoever whereby they have laboured to void the rooms of their Spiritual Superiours before Authorized and to advance the new fancied Scepter of Lay Presbyterial Power The Nature of Spiritual Iurisdiction BUt before there can be any setled Determination whether Truth do rest on their part or on ours touching Lay-Elders we are to prepare the way thereunto by explication of some things requisite and very needful to be considered as first how besides that Spiritual Power which is of Order and was instituted for performance of those duties whereof there hath been Speech already had there is in the Church no less necessary a second kind which we call the Power of Jurisdiction When the Apostle doth speak of ruling the Church of God and of receiving accusations his words have evident reference to the Power of Jurisdiction Our Saviours words to the Power of Order when he giveth his Disciples charge saying Preach Baptize Do this in Remembrance of me 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epist ad Smyrn A Bishop saith Ignatius doth bear the Image of God and of Christ of God in ruling of Christ in administring holy things By this therefore we see a manifest difference acknowledged between the Power of Ecclesiastical Order and the power of Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical The Spiritual Power of the Church being such as neither can be challenged by right of Nature nor could by humane Authority be instituted because the forces and effects thereof are Supernatural and Divine we are to make no doubt or question but that from him which is the Head it hath descended unto us that are the Body now invested therewith He gave it for the benefit and good of Souls as a mean to keep them in the path which leadeth unto endless felicity a bridle to hold them within their due and convenient bounds and if they do go astray a forcible help to reclaim them Now although there be no kind of Spiritual Power for which our Lord Iesus Christ did not give both commission to exercise and direction how to use the same although his Laws in that behalf recorded by the holy Evangelists be the only ground and foundation whereupon the practice of the Church must sustain it self yet as all multitudes once grown to the form of Societies are even thereby naturally warranted to enforce upon their own subjects particularly those things which publick wisdom shall judge expedient for the common good so it were absurd to imagine the Church it self the most glorious amongst them abridged of this liberty or to think that no Law Constitution or Canon can be further made either for Limitation or Amplification in the practice of our Saviours Ordinances whatsoever occasion be offered through variety of times and things during the state of this inconstant world which bringeth forth daily such new evills as must of necessity by new remedies be redrest did both of old enforce our venerable Predecessor and will alwaies constrain others sometime to make sometime to abrogate sometime to augment and again to abridge sometime in sum often to vary alter and change Customs incident unto the manner of exercising that Power which doth it self continue alwaies one and the same I therefore conclude that Spiritual Authority is a Power which Christ hath given to be used over them which are subject unto it for the eternal good of their Souls according to his own most Sacred Laws and the wholsome positive Constitutions of his Church In Doctrine referred unto Action and Practice as this is which concerns Spiritual Jurisdiction the first sound and perfect understanding is the knowledge of the End because thereby both Use doth frame and Contemplation judge all things Of Penitency the chiefest End propounded by Spiritual Iurisdiction Two kinds of Penitency the one a Private Duty toward God the other a Duty of external Discipline Of the vertue of Repentance from which the former Duty proceedeth and of Contrition the first part of that Duty SEeing that the chiefest cause of Spiritual Jurisdiction is to provide for the health and safety of Mens Souls by bringing them to see and Repent their grievous offences committed against God as also to reform all injuries offered with the breach of Christian Love and Charity toward their brethren in matters of Ecclesiastical Cognizance the use of this Power shall by so much the plainlier appear if first the nature of Repentance it self be known We are by Repentance to appease whom we offend by Sin For which cause whereas all Sin deprives us of the favour of Almighty God our way of Reconciliation with him is the inward secret Repentance of the heart which inward
Government is confirmed yea strengthened it is and ratified even by the not establishment thereof in all Churches every where at the first 2. When they further dispute That if any such thing were usedful Christ would in Scripture have set down particular Statutes and Laws appointing that Bishops should be made and prescribing in what order even as the Law doth for all kinde of Officers which were needful in the Iewish Regiment might not a man that would bend his wit to maintain the fury of the Petrobrusian Hereticks in pulling down Oratories use the self-same argument with as much countenance of reason If it were needful that we should assemble our selves in Churches would that God which taught the Iews so exactly the frame of their sumptuous Temple leave us no particular instructions in writing no not so much at which way to lay any one stone Surely such kinde of Argumentation doth not so strengthen the sinews of their cause as weaken the credit of their Judgement which are led therewith 3. And whereas Thirdly in disproof of that use which Episcopal Authority hath in Judgement of Spiritual Causes they bring forth the verdict of Cyprian who saith That equity requireth every man's Cause to be heard where the fault he was charged with was committed forasmuch as there they may have both Accusers and Witnesses in the Cause This Argument grounding it self on Principles no lesse true in Civil than in Ecclesiastical Causes unless it be qualified with some exceptions or limitations over-turneth the highest Tribunal Seats both in Church and Common-wealth it taketh utterly away all appeals it secretly condemneth even the blessed Apostle himself as having transgressed the law of Equity by his appeal from the Court of Iudea unto those higher which were in Rome The generality of such kinde of axioms deceiveth unless it be construed with such cautions as the matter whereunto they are applyable doth require An usual and ordinary transportation of causes out of Africa into Italy out of one Kingdom into another as discontented Persons list which was the thing which Cyprian disalloweth may be unequal and unmeet and yet not therefore a thing unnecessary to have the Courts erectted in higher places and judgement committed unto greater Persons to whom the meaner may bring their causes either by way of appeal ot otherwise to be determined according to the order of Justice which hath been always observed every where in Civil States and is no less requisite also for the State of the Church of God The Reasons which teach it to be expedient for the one will shew it to be for the other at leastwise not unnecessary Inequality of Pastors is an Ordinance both Divine and profitable Their exceptions against it in these two respects we have shewed to be altogether causless unreasonable and unjust XIV The next thing which they upbraid us with is the difference between that inequality of Pastors which hath been of old and which now is For at length they grant That the superiority of Bishops and of Arch-bishops is somewhat antient but no such kinde of Superiority as ours have By the Laws of our Discipline a Bishop may ordain without asking the Peoples consent a Bishop may excommunicate and release alone a Bishop may imprison a Bishop may bear Civil Office in the Realm a Bishop may be a Counsellor of State these thing antient Bishops neither did nor might do Be it granted that ordinarily neither in elections nor deprivations neither in excommunicating nor in releasing the excommunicate in none of the weighty affairs of Government Bishops of old were wont to do any thing without consultation with their Clergy and consent of the People under them Be it granted that the same Bishops did neither touch any man with corporal punishment nor meddle with secular affairs and Offices the whole Clergy of God being then tyed by the strict and severe Canons of the Church to use no other than ghostly power to attend no other business than heavenly Tarquinius was in the Roman Common-wealth deservedly hated of whose unorderly proceedings the History speaketh thus Hic Regum primus traditum à Prioribus morem de omnibus Senatum consulendi solvit domesticis Consillis Rempub. administravit bellum pacem foedera societates perse ipsum cum quibus voluit injussu Populi ac Senatus fecit diremitque Against Bishops the like is objected That they are Invaders of other mens right and by intolerable usurpation take upon them to do that alone wherein antient Laws have appointed that others not they onely should bear sway Let the Case of Bishops he put not in such sort as it is but even as their very heavyest Adversaries would devise it Suppose that Bishops at the first had encroached upon the Church that by sleights and cunning practises they had appropriated Ecclesiastical as Augustus did Imperial power that they had taken the advantage of mens inclinable affections which did not suffer them for Revenue-sake to be suspected of Ambition that in the mean while their usurpation had gone forward by certain easie and unsensible degrees that being not discerned in the growth when it was thus farr grown as we now see it hath proceeded the world at length perceiving there was just cause of complaint but no place of remedy left had assented unto it by a general secret agreement to bear it now as an helpless evil all this supposed for certain and true yet surely a thing of this nature as for the Superiour to do that alone unto which of right the consent of some other Inferiours should have been required by them though it had an indirect entrance at the first must needs through continuance of so many ages as this hath stood be made now a thing more natural to the Church than that it should be opprest with the mention of contrary Orders worn so many ages since quite and clean out of ure But with Bishops the case is otherwise For in doing that by themselves which others together with them have been accustomed to do they do not any thing but that whereunto they have been upon just occasion authorized by orderly means All things natural have in them naturally more or less the power of providing for their own safety And as each particular man hath this power so every Politick Society of men must needs have the same that thereby the whole may provide for the good of all parts therein For other benefit we have not any by sorting our selves into Politick Societies saving only that by this mean each part hath that relief which the vertue of the whole is able to yield it The Church therefore being a Politick Society or Body cannot possibly want the power of providing for it self And the chiefest part of that power consisteth in the Authority of making Laws Now forasmuch as Corporations are perpetual the Laws of the antienter Church cannot chuse but binde the latter while they are in force But we
must note withal that because the body of the Church continueth the same it hath the same Authority still and may abrogate old Laws or make new as need shall require Wherefore vainly are the antient Canons and Constitutions objected as Laws when once they are either let secretly to dye by dis-usage or are openly abrogated by contrary Laws The Antient had cause to do no otherwise than they did and yet so strictly they judged not themselves in Conscience bound to observe those Orders but that in sundry cases they easily dispensed therewith which I suppose they would never have done had they esteemed them as things whereunto everlasting immutable and undispensible observation did belong The Bishop usually promoted none which were not first allowed as fit by conference had with the rest of his Clergy and with the People Notwithstanding in the case of Aurelius Saint Cyprian did otherwise In matters of Deliberation and Counsel for disposing of that which belongeth generally to the whole body of the Church or which being more particular is nevertheless of so great consequence that it needeth the force of many Judgements conferred in such things the common saying must necessarily take place An Eye cannot see that which Eyes can As for Clerical Ordinations there are no such reasons alledged against the Order which is but that it may be esteemed as good in every respect as that which hath been and in some considerations better at leastwise which is sufficient to our purpose it may be held in the Church of Christ without transgressing any Law either Antient or Late Divine or Human. which we ought to observe and keep The form of making Ecclesiastical Officers hath sundry parts neither are they all of equal moment When Deacons having not been before in the Church of Christ the Apostles saw it needful to have such ordained They first assemble the multitude and shew them how needful it is that Deacons be made Secondly they name unto them what number they judge convenient what quality the men must be of and to the People they commit the care of finding such out Thirdly the People hereunto assenting make their choyce of Stephen and the rest those chosen men they bring and present before the Apostles Howbeit all this doth not endue them with any Ecclesiastical Power But when so much was done the Apostles finding no cause to take exception did with Prayer and imposition of hands make them Deacons This was it which gave them their very being all other things besides were only preparations unto this Touching the form of making Presbyters although it be not wholly of purpose anywhere set down in the Apostles Writings yet sundry speeches there are which insinuate the chiefest things that belong unto that Action As when Paul and Barnabas are said to have fasted prayed and made Presbyters When Timothy is willed to lay hands suddenly on no man for fear of participating with other mens sins For this cause the Order of the Primitive Church was between Choyce and Ordination to have some space for such Probation and Tryal as the Apostle doth mention in Deacons saying Let them first be proved and then minister if so be they be found blameless Alexander Severus beholding in his time how careful the Church of Christ was especially for this point how after the choyce of their Pastors they used to publish the names of the Parties chosen and not to give them the final act of Approbation till they saw whether any lett or impediment would be alledged he gave Commandment That the like should also be done in his own Imperial Elections adding this as a Reason wherefore he so required namely For that both Christians and Iews being so wary about the Ordination of their Priests it seemed very unequal for him not to be in like sort circumspect to whom he committed the Government of Provinces containing power over mens both Estates and Lives This the Canon Law it self doth provide for requiring before Ordination scrutiny Let them diligently be examined three dayes together before the Sabbath and on the Sabbath let them be presented unto the Bishop And even this in effect also is the very use of the Church of England at all Solemne Ordaining of Ministers and if all Ordaining were Solemne I must confesse it were much the better The pretended disorder of the Church of England is that Bishops Ordain them to whose Election the People give no voyces and so the Bishops make them alone that is to say they give Ordination without Popular Election going before which antient Bishops neither did nor might do Now in very truth if the multitude have hereunto a right which right can never be translated from them for any cause then is there no remedy but we must yield that unto the lawful making of Ministers the voyce of the People is required and that according to the Adverse Parties Assertion such as make Ministers without asking the Peoples consent do but exercise a certain Tyranny At the first Erection of the Common-weals of Rome the People for so it was then fittest determined of all affairs Afterwards this growing troublesome their Senators did that for them which themselves before had done In the end all came to one man's hands and the Emperour alone was instead of many Senators In these things the experience of time may breed both Civil and Ecclesiastical change from that which hath been before received neither do latter things always violently exclude former but the one grawing less convenient then it hath been giveth place to that which is now become more That which was fit for the People themselves to do at the first might afterwards be more convenient for them to do by some other Which other is not thereby proved a Tyrant because he alone doth that which a multitude were wont to do unless by violence he take that Authority upon him against the Order of Law and without any publick appointment as with us if any did it should I suppose not long be safe for him so to do This Answer I hope will seem to be so much the more reasonable in that themselves who stand against us have furnish'd us therewith For whereas against the making of Ministers by Bishops alone their use hath been to object What sway the People did bear when Stephen and rest were ordained Deacons They begin to espy how their own Plat-form swerveth not a little from that example wherewith they controul the practices of others For touching the form of the Peoples concurrence in that Action they observe it not no they plainly profess that they are not in this point bound to be followers of the Apostles The Apostles Ordained whom the People had first chosen They hold that their Ecclesiastical Senate ought both to choose and also to Ordain Do not themselves then take away that which the Apostles gave the People namely the priviledge of chusing Ecclesiastical Officers They do But behold in what sort
consisteth in the matter about which the actions of each are conversant and not in this that Civil Royalty admitteth but one Ecclesiastical Government requireth many Supreme Correctors Which Allegation were it true would prove no more than only that some certain number is necessary for the assistance of the Bishop But that a number of such as they do require is necessary how doth it prove Wherefore albeit Bishops should now do the very same which the Antients did using the Colledge of Presbyters under them as their Assistants when they administer Church-Censures yet should they still swerve utterly from that which these men so busily labour for because the Agents whom they require to assist in those Cases are a sort of Lay-Elders such as no antient Bishop ever was assisted with Shall these fruitless jarrs and janglings never cease shall we never see end of them How much happier were the World if those eager Task-masters whose eyes are so curious and sharp in discerning what should be done by many and what by few were all changed into painful doers of that which every good Christian man ought either only or chiefly to do and to be found therein doing when that great and glorious Judge of all mens both deeds and words shall appear In the mean while be it One that hath this charge or be they Many that be his Assistants let there be careful provision that Justice may be administred and in this shall our God be glorified more than by such contentious Disputes XV. Of which nature that also is wherein Bishops are over and besides all this accused to have much more excessive power than the antient in as much as unto their Ecclesiastical authority the Civil Magistrate for the better repressing of such as contemn Ecclesiastical censures hath for divers ages annexed Civil The crime of Bishops herein is divided into these two several branches the one that in Causes Ecclesiastical they strike with the sword of Secular punishments the other that Offices are granted them by vertue whereof they meddle with Civil Affairs Touching the one it reacheth no farther than only unto restraint of liberty by imprisonment which yet is not done but by the Laws of the Land and by vertue of authority derived from the Prince A thing which being allowable in Priests amongst the Jews must needs have received some strange alteration in nature since if it be now so pernicious and venomous to be coupled with a Spiritual Vocation in any man which beareth Office in the Church of Christ. Shemaia writing to the Colledge of Priests which were in Ierusalem and to Zâ—phania the principal of them told them they were appointed of God that they might be Officers in the House of the Lord for every man which raved and did make himselfe a Prophet to the end that they might by the force of this their authority put such in Prison and in the Stocks His malice is reproved for that he provoketh them to shew their power against the innocent But surely when any man justly punishable had been brought before them it could be no unjust thing for them even in such sort then to have punished As for Offices by vertue whereof Bishops have to deal in Civil Affairs we must consider that Civil Affairs are of divers kindesâ— and as they be not all fit for Ecclesiastical Persons to meddle with so neither is it necessary nor at this day haply convenient that from meddling with any such thing at all they all should without exception be secluded I will therefore set down some few causes wherein it cannot but clearly appear unto reasonable men that Civil and Ecclesiastical Functions may be lawfully united in one and the same Person First therefore in case a Christian Society be planted amongst their professed enemies or by toleration do live under some certain State whereinto they are not incorporated whom shall we judge the meetest men to have the hearing and determining of such mere civil Controversies as are every day wont to grow between man and man Such being the state of the Church of Corinth the Apostle giveth them this direction Dare any of you having business against another be judged by the unjust and not under Saints Do ye not know that the Saints shall judge the World If the World then shall be judged by you are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters Know ye not that we shall judge the Angels How much more things that appertain to this life If then ye have judgement of things pertaining to this life set up them which are least esteemed in the Church I speak it to your shame Is it so that there is not a wise man amongst you us not one that can judge between his Brethren but a Brother goeth to law with a Brother and that under the Infidels Now therefore there is utterly a fault among you because ye go to Law one with another Why rather suffer ye not wrong why rather sustain ye not harm In which Speech there are these degrees Better to suffer and to put up Injuries than to contend better to end contention by Arbitrement then by Judgement better by Judgement before the wisest of their own than before the simpler better before the simplest of their own than the wisest of them without So that if judgement of Secular affairs should be committed unto wise men unto men of chiefest Credit and Account amongst them when the Pastors of their Souls are such Who more fit to be also their Judges for the ending of strikes The wisest in things divine may be also in things humane the most skilful At leastwise they are by likelihood commonly more able to know right from wrong than the common un-lettered sort And what St. Augustin did hereby gather his own words do sufficiently show I call God to witness upon my Soul saith he that according to the Order which is kept in well-ordered Monasteries I could wish to have every day my hours of labouring with my hands my hours of reading and of praying rather than to endure these most tumultuous perplexities of other men's causes which I am forced to bear while I travel in Secular businesses either by judging to discuss them or to cut them off by intreaty Unto which toyles that Apostle who himself sustained them not for any thing we read hath notwithstanding â—yed us not of his own accord but being thereunto directed by that Spirit which speaks in him His own Apostleship which drew him to travel up and down suffered him not to be any where settled for this purpose wherefore the wise faithful and holy men which were seated here and there and not them which travelled up and down to preach he made Examiners of such Businesses Whereupon of him it is no where written that he had leisure to attend these things from which we cannot excuse our selves although we be simple because even such he requireth if wise men cannot be had rather than
most willingly thereunto even of reverence to the Most High with the Flower of whose sanctified Inheritance as it were with a kinde of Divine presence unless their Chiefest Civil Assemblies were so farr forth beautified as might be without any notable impediment unto their Heavenly Fâ—nctions they could not satisfie themselves as having showed towards God an Affection most duâ—iful Thus first in defect of other Civil Magistrates Secondly for the ease and quietness of Scholastical Societies Thirdly by way of Political necessity Fourthly in regard of quality care and extraordinancy Fifthly For countenance into the Ministry And lastly even of Devotion and Reverence towards God himself there may be admitted at leastwise in some Particulars well and lawfully enough a conjunction of Civil and Ecclesiastical Power except there be some such Law or Reason to the contrary as may prove it to be a thing simply in it self naught Against it many things are objected as first That the matters which are noted in the holy Scripture to have belonged unto the ordinary Office of any Minister of God's holy Word and Sacraments are these which follow with such like and no other namely The watch of the Sanctuary the business of God the Ministry of the Word and Sacraments Oversight of the House of God Watching over his Flock Prophesie Prayer Dispensations of the Mysteries of God Charge and care of mens Souls If a man would shew what the Offices and Duties of a Chirurgion or Physician are I suppose it were not his part so much as to mention any thing belonging to the one or the other in case either should be also a Souldier or a Merchant or an House-keeper or a Magistrate Because the Functions of these are different from those of the former albeit one and the same man may happily be both The Case is like when the Scripture teacheth what Duties are required in an Ecclesiastical Minister in describing of whose Office to touch any other thing than such as properly and directly toucheth his Office that way were impertinent Yea But in the Old Testament the two Powers Civil and Ecclesiastical were distinguished not onely in Nature but also in Person the one committed unto Moses and the Magistrates joyned with him the other to Aaron and his Sons Jehosophat in his Reformation doth not onely distinguish Causes Ecclesiastical from Civil and erecteth divers Courts for them but appointeth also divers Iudges With the Jews these two Powers were not so distinguished but that sometimes they might and did concâ—â— in one and the same Person Was not Ely both Priest and Judge After their return from captivity Esâ—â—as a Priest and the same their Chief Governour even in Civil Affairs also These men which urge the necessity of making always a Personal distinction of these two Powers as if by Iehosaphat's example the same Person ought not to deal in both Causes yet are not scrupulous to make men of Civil Place and Calling Presbyters and Ministers of Spiritual Jurisdiction in their own Spiritual Consistories If it be against the Jewish Precedents for us to give Civil Power unto such as have Ecclesiastical is it not as much against the same for them to give Ecclesiastical Power unto such as have Civil They will answer perhaps That their Position is onely against conjunction of Ecclesiastical Power of Order and the Power of Civil Jurisdiction in one Person But this Answer will not stand with their Proofs which make no less against the Power of Civil and Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction in one Person for of these two Powers Iehosaphat's example is Besides the contrary example of Heli and of Ezra by us alledged do plainly shew that amongst the Jewes even the power of Order Ecclesiastical and Civil Jurisdiction were sometimes lawfully united in one and the same Person Pressed further we are with our Lord and Saviour's example who denyeth his Kingdom to be of this Wold and therefore as not standing with his Calling refused to be made a King to give sentence in a criminal Cause of Adultery and in a Civil of dividing an Inheritance The Jews imagining that their Messiah should be a Potent Monarch upon Earth no marvail though when they did otherwise wonder at Christ's greatness they sought forthwith to have him invested with that kinde of Dignity to the end he might presently begin to reign Others of the Jewes which likewise had the same imagination of the Messiah and did somehat incline to think that peradventure this might be He thought good to try whether he would take upon him that which he might do being a King such as they supposed their true Messiah should be But Christ refused to be a King over them because it was no part of the Office of their Messiah as they did falsely conceive and to intermeddle in those Acts of Civil Judgement be refused also because he had no such Jurisdiction in that Common-wealth being in regard of his Civil Person a man of mean and low Calling As for repugnancy between Ecclesiastical and Civil Power or any inconvenience that these two Powers should be united it doth not appear that this was the cause of his resistance either to reign or else to judge What say we then to the blessed Apostles who teach That Souldiers intangle not themselves with the businesses of this life but leave them to the end they may please him who hath chosen them to serve and that so the good Souldiers of Christ â—ught to do The Apostles which taught this did never take upon them any Place or Office of Civil Power No they gave over the Ecclesiastical care of the Poor that they might wholly attend upon the Word and Prayer St. Paul indeed doth exhort Timothy after this manner Suffer thou evil as a noble Souldier of Iesus Christ No man warring is entangled with the affairs of Life because he must serve such as have pressed him unto Warfare The sense and meaning whereof is plain that Souldiers may not be nice and tender that they must be able to endure hardnesse that no man betaking himself unto Wars continueth entangled with such kinde of Businesses as tend only unto the ease and quiet felicity of this Life but if the service of him who hath taken them under his Banner require the hazard yea the losse of their Lives to please himâ— they must be content and willing with any difficulty any peril be it never so much against the natural desire which they have to live in safety And at this point the Clergy of God must always stand thus it behoveth them to be affected as oft as their Lord and Captain leadeth them into the field whatsoever conflicts perils or evils they are to endure Which duty being not such but that therewith the Civil Dignities which Ecclesiastical Persons amongst us do enjoy may enough stand the Exhortation of Paul to Timothy is but a slender Allegation against them As well might we gather out of this place that Men having Children or Wives
up a Pillar shall be the House of God and of all that thou shall give me will I give the Tenth unto thee May a Christian man desire as great things as Iacob did at the hands of God may he desire them in as earliest manner may he promise as great thankfulness in acknowledging the goodness of God may he vow any certain kinde of publick acknowledgment before hand or though he vow it not perform it after in such sort that men may see he is perswaded how the Lord hath been his God Are these particular kindes of testifying thankfulness to God the erecting of Oratories the dedicating of Lands and Goods to maintain them forbidden any where Let any mortal man living shew but one reason wherefore in this point to follow Iacob's example should not be a thing both acceptable unto God and in the eyes of the World for ever most highly commendable Concerning Goods of this nature Goods whereof when we speak we term them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Goods that are consecrated unto God and as Tertullian speaketh Deposit a pietatis things which Piety and Devotion hath laid up as it were in the bosom of God Touching such Goods the Law Civil following mere light of Nature defineth them to be no mans because no mortal man or community of men hath right of propriety in them XXIII Persons Ecclesiastical are God's Stewards not onely for that he hath set them over his Family as the Ministers of ghostly food but even for this very cause also that they are to receive and dispose his Temporal Revenues the gifts and oblations which men bring him Of the Jews it is plain that their Tyths they offered unto the Lord and those offerings the Lord bestowed upon the Levites When the Levites gave the Tenth of their Tythes this their Gift the Law doth term the Lord's Heave-offering and appoint that the High-Priest should receive the same Of spoils taken in War that part which they were accustomed to separate unto God they brought it before the Priest of the Lord by whom it was laid up in the Tabernacle of the Congregation for a memorial of their thankfulness towards God and his goodness towards them in fighting for them against their enemies As therefore the Apostle magnifieth the honor of Melchisedec in that he being an High-Priest did receive at the hands of Abraham the Tyths which Abraham did honor God with so it argueth in the Apostles themselves great honor that at their feet the price of those Possessions was laid which men thought good to bestow on Christ. St. Paul commending the Churches which were in Macedonia for their exceeding liberality this way saith of them That he himself would bear record they had declared their forward mindes according to their power yea beyond their power and had so much exceeded his expectation of them that they seemed as it were even to give away themselves first to the Lord saith the Apostle and then by the will of God unto us To him as the owner of such gifts to us as his appointed receivers and dispensers The gift of the Church of Antioch bestowed unto the use of distressed Brethren which were in Iudea Paul and Baruabar did deliver unto the Presbyters of Ierusalem and the head of those Presbyters was Iames he therefore the Chiefest disposer thereof Amongst those Canons which are entituled Apostolical one is this We appoint that the Bishop have care of these things which belong to the Church the meaning is of Church-Goods as the Reason following sheweth For if the precious Souls of men must be committed unto him of trust much more it beloveth the charge of money to be given him that by his Authority the Presbyters and Deacons may administer all things to them that stand in need So that he which hath done them the honor to be as it were his Treasurers hath left them also authority and power to use these his Treasures both otherwise and for the maintenance even of their own Estate the lower sort of the Clergy according unto a meaner the higher after a larger proportion The use of Spiritual goods and possessions hath been a matte◠much disputed of grievous complaints there are usually made against the evil and unlawful usage of them but with no certain determination hitherto on what things and Persons with what proportion and measure they being bestowed do retain their lawful use Some men condemn it as idle superfluous and altogether vain that any part of the Treasure of God should be spent upon costly Ornaments appertaining unto his Service who being best worshipped when he is served in Spirit and truth hath not for want of pomp and magnificence rejected at any time those who with faithful hearts have adored him Whereupon the Hereticks termed Henriciani and Petrobusiani threw down Temples and Houses of Prayer erected with marvellous great charge as being in that respect not fit for Christ by us to be honored in We deny not but that they who sometime wandred as Pilgrims on earth and had no Temples but made Caves and Dens to pray in did God such honor as was most acceptable in his sight God did not reject them for their poverty and nakedness sake Their Sacraments were not abhorred for want of Vessels of Gold Howbeit let them who thus delight to plead answer me When Moses first and afterwards David exhorted the people of Israel unto matter of charge about the service of God suppose we it had been allowable in them to have thus pleaded Our Fathers in Egypt served God devoutly God war with them in all their afflictions he heard their Prayers pitied their Case and delivered them from the tyranny of their oppressors what House Tabernacle or Temple had they Such Argumentations are childish and fond God doth not refuse to be honored at all where there lacketh wealth but where abundance and store is he there requireth the Flower thereof being bestowed on him to be employed even unto the Ornament of his Service In Egypt the state of his People was servitude and therefore his Service was accordingly In the Defart they had no sooner ought of their own but a Tabernacle is required and in the Land of Canaan a Temple In the eyes of David it seemed a thing not fit a thing not decent that himself should be more richly seated than God But concerning the use of Ecclesiastical Goods bestowed this way there is not so much contention amongst us as what measure of allowance is fit for Ecclesiastical Persons to be maintained with A better rule in this case to judge things by we cannot possibly have than the◠Wisdom of God himself by considering what he thought meet for each degree of the Clergy to enjoy in time of the Law what for Levites what for Priests and what for High-Priests somewhat we shall be the more able to discern rightly what may be fit convenient and right for
Civil Magistrate being termed Head by reason of that Authority in Ecclesiastical Affairs which hath been already declared that themselves do acknowledge to be lawful It followeth that he is a Head even subordinated of Christ and to Christ. For more plain explication whereof unto God we acknowledge daily that Kingdom Power and Glory are his that he is the immortal and invisible King of Ages as well the future which shall be as the present which now is That which the Father doth work as Lord and King over all he worketh not without but by the Son who through coeternal generation receiveth of the Father that Power which the Father hath of himself And for that cause our Saviours words concerning his own Dominion are To me all Power both in Heaven and in Earth is given The Father by the Son did create and doth guide all wherfore Christ hath Supream dominion over the whole universal World Christ is God Christ is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the consubstantial Word of God Christ is also that consubstantial Word which made man As God he saith of himself I am Alpha and Omega the beginning and the end he which was and which is and which is to come even the very Omnipotent As the consubstantial Word of God he hath with God before the beginning of the World that glory which as he was Man he requireth to have Father glorifie thy Son with that glory which with thee be enjoyed before the World wa◠Further it is not necessary that all things spoken of Christ should agree to him either as God or else as Man but some things as he is the consubstantial Word of God some things as he is that Word incarnate The Works of Supream Dominion which have been since the first beginning wrought by the power of the Son of God are now most properly and truly the Works of the Son of Man the Word made Flesh doth sit for ever and reign as Soveraign Lord over all Dominion belongeth unto the Kingly Office of Christ as Propitration and Mediation unto his Priestly Instruction unto his Pastoral and Prophetical Office His Works of Dominion are in sundry degrees and kindes according to the different conditions of them that are subject unto it he presently doth govern and hereafter shall judge the World intire and wholly and therefore his Regal power cannot be with truth restrained unto a proportion of the World only Notwithstanding forasmuch as all do not shew and acknowledge with dutiful submission that Obedience which they owe unto him therefore such as do their Lord he is termed by way of excellency no otherwise than the Apostle doth term God the Saviour generally of all but especially of the Faithful these being brought to the obedience of Faith are every where spoken of as men translated into that Kingdom wherein whosoever is comprehended Christ is the Author of eternal Salvation unto them they have a high and ghostly fellowship with God and Christ and Saints as the Apostle in more ample manner speaketh Aggregated they are unto Mount Sion and to the City of the living God the Celestial Ierusalem and to the company of innumerable Angels and to the Congregation of the first born which are written in Heaven and to God the Iudge of all and to the Spirits of just and perfect men and to Iesus the Mediator of the new Testament In a word they are of that Mystical body which we term the Church of Christ. As for the rest we account them Aliens from the Common-wealth of Israel and that live in the Kingdom of Darkness and that are in this present World without God Our Saviours Dominion is therefore over these as over Rebels over them as over dutiful and loving Subjects which things being in holy Scriptures so plain I somewhat muse at that strange position That Christ in the Government of his Church and Superiority over the Officers of it hath himself a Superiour which is the Father but in governing of Kingdoms and Common wealths and in the Superiority which he hath over Kingdoms no Superiour Again That the Civil Magistrates Authority commeth from God immediately as Christs doth and it subordinate unto Christ. In what Evangelist Apostle or Prophet is it found that Christ Supream Governour of the Church should be so unequal to himself as he is Supream Governor of Kingdoms The works of his Providence for the preservation of Mankinde by upholding Kingdoms not only obedient unto but also obstinate and rebellious against him are such as proceed from Divine Power and are not the works of his Providence for safety of God's Elect by gathering inspiring comforting and every way preserving his Church such as proceed from the same Power likewise Surely if Christ as God and Man hath ordained certain means for the gathering and keeping of his Church seeing this doth belong to the Government of that Church it must in reason follow I think that as God and Man he worketh in Church Regiment and consequently hath no more there any Superiours than in the Government of the Common-wealth Again to be in the midst of his wheresoever they are assembled in his Name and to be with them to the World's end are comforts which Christ doth perform to his Church as Lord and Governour yea such as he cannot perform but by that very Power wherein he hath no Superiour Wherefore unless it can be proved that all the works of our Saviours Government in the Church are done by the mere and onely force of his Human nature there is no remedy but to acknowledge it a manifest errour that Christ in the Government of the World is equal to the Father but not in the Government of the Church Indeed to the honour of this Dominion it cannot be said that God did exalt him otherwise than only according to that Human nature wherein he was made low For as the Son of God there could no advancement or exaltation grow unto him And yet the Dominion whereunto he was in his Human nature lifted up is not without Divine Power exercised It is by Divine Power that the Son of man who sitteth in Heaven doth work as King and Lord upon us which are on Earth The exercise of his Dominion over the Church Militant cannot choose but cease when there is no longer any Militant Church in the World And therefore as Generals of Armies when they have finished their Work are wont to yield up such Commissions as were given for that purpose and to remain in the state of Subjects and not as Lords as concerning their former authority even so when the end of all things is come the Son of man who till then reigneth shall do the like as touching Regiment over the Militant Church on the Earth So that between the Son of man and his Brethren over whom he reigneth now in this their War fare there shall be then as touching the exercise of that Regiment no such difference they not warfaring
If there be of the antient Fathers which say That thee is but one Head of the Church Christ and that the Minister that baptizeth cannoâ—â—e the Head of him that is baptized because Christ is the Head of the whole Church and tat Paul could not be Head of the Church which he planted because Christ is the Head of the whole Body They understand the name of Head in such sort as we grant that it is oâ— applicable to any other no not in relation to the least part of the whole Churh he which baptizeth baptizeth into Christ he which converteth converteth into Christ he which ruleth ruleth for Christ. The whole Church can have but one to be Head as Lord and Owner of all wherefore if Christ be Head in that kinde it followeth that no other besides can be so either to the whole or to any part To call and dissolve all solemn Assemblies about the Publick Affairs of the Church AMongst sundry Prerogatives of Simons Dominion over the Jews there is reckoned as not the least That no man might gather any great Assembly in the Land without him For so the manner of Jewish Regiment had alwayes been that whether the cause for which men assembled themselves in peaceable good and orderly sort were Ecclesiastical or Civil Supream Authority should assemble them David gathered all Israel together unto Ierusalem when the Ark was to be removed he assembled the Sons of Aaron and the Levites Solomon did the like at such time as the Temple was to be dedicated when the Church was to be reformed Asa in his time did the same The same upon like occasions was done afterwards by Ioash Hezekiat Iosiah and others The Consuls of Rome Polybius affirmeth to have had a kinde of Regal Authority in that they might call together the Senate and People whensoever it pleased them Seeing therefore the Affairs of the Church and Christian Religion are Publick Affairs for the ordering whereof more Solemn Assemblies sometimes are of as great importance and use as they are for Secular Affairs It seemeth no less an act of Supream Authority to call the one then the other Wherefore the Clergy in such wise gathered together is an Ecclesiastical Senate which with us as in former times the chiefest Prelate at his discretion did use to assemble so that afterwards in such considerations as have been before specified it seemed more meet to annex the said Prerogative to the Crown The plot of reformed Discipline not liking thereof so well taketh order that every former Assembly before it breaketh up should it self appoint both the time and place of their After-meeting again But because I finde not any thing on that side particularly alledged against us herein a longer disputation about so plain a cause shall not need The antient Imperial Law forbiddeth such Assemblies as the Emperor's Authority did not cause to be made Before Emperors became Christians the Church had never any General Synod their greatest Meeting consisting of Bishops and others the gravest in each Province As for the Civil Governor's Authority it suffered them only as things not regarded or not accounted of at such times as it did suffer them So that what right a Christian King hath as touching Assemblies of that kinde we are not able to judge till we come to later times when Religion had won the hearts of the highest Powers Constantine as Pighius doth grant was not only the first that ever did call any General Councel together but even the first that devised the calling of them for consultation about the businesses of God After he had once given the example his Successors a long time followed the same in so much that St. Hierom to disprove the Authority of a Synod which was pretended to be general useth this as a forcible Argument Dic quis Imperator have Synodum jusserit convocari Their Answer hereunto is no Answer which say That the Emperors did not this without conference had with the Bishops for to our purpose it is enough if the Clergy alone did it not otherwise than by the leave and appointment of their Soveraign Lords and Kings Whereas therefore it is on the contrary side alledged that Valentinian the elder being requested by Catholick Bishops to grant that there might be a Synod for the ordering of matters called in question by the Arians answered that he being one of the Laity might not meddle with such matters and thereupon willed that the Priests and Bishops to whom the care of those things belongeth should meet and consult together by themselves where they thought good We must with the Emperor's speech weigh the occasion and drift thereof Valentinian and Valens the one a Catholick the other an Arian were Emperors together Valens the Governour of the East and Valentinian of the West Empire Valentinian therefore taking his Journey from the East unto the West parts and passing for that intent through Thracia there the Bishops which held the soundnesse of Christian Belief because they knew that Valent was their professed Enemy and therefore if the other was once departed out of those quarters the Catholick Cause was like to finde very small favour moved presently Valentinian about a Councel to be assembled under the countenance of his Authority who by likelihood considering what inconvenience might grow thereby inasmuch as it could not be but a means to incense Valens the more against them refused himself to be Author of or present at any such Assembly and of this his denyal gave them a colourable reason to wit that he was although an Emperour yet a secular Person and therefore not able in matters of so great obscurity to fit as a competent Judge But if they which were Bishops and learned men did think good to consule thereof together they might Whereupon when they could not obtain that which they most desired yet that which he granted unto them they took and forthwith had a Councel Valentinian went on towards Rome they remaining in consultation till Valens which accompanied him returned back so that now there was no remedy but either to incurr a manifest contempt or else at the hands of Valens himself to seek approbation of that they had done To him therefore they became Suitors his Answer was short Either Arianism or Exile which they would whereupon their Banishment ensued Let reasonable men now therefore be Judges how much this example of Valentinian doth make against the Authority which we say that Soveraign Rulers may lawfully have as concerning Synods and Meetings Ecclesiastical Of the Authority of making Laws THere are which wonder that we should account any Statute a Law which the High Court of Parliament in England hath established about the matters of Church-Regiment the Prince and Court of Parliament having as they suppose no more lawful means to give order to the Church and Clergy in those things than they have to make Laws for the Hierarchies of Angels in Heaven
respect of their bad qualities their wickedness in it self a deprivation of right to deal in the affairs of the Church and a warrant for others to deal in them which are held to be of a clean other Society the Members whereof have been before so peremptorily for ever excluded from power of dealing for ever with affairs of the Church They which once have learned throughly this Lesson will quickly be capable perhaps of another equivalent unto it For the wickedness of the Ministery transfers their right unto the King In case the King be as wicked as they to whom then shall the right descend There is no remedy all must come by devolution at length even as the Family of Brown will have it unto the godly among the people for confusion unto the wise and the great by the poor and the simple Some Kniper doling with his retinue must take this work of the Lord in hand and the making of Church-Laws and Orders must prove to be their right in the end If not for love of the truth yet for shame of grosse absurdities let these contentions and stifling fancies be abandoned The cause which moved them for a time to hold a wicked Ministery no lawful Ministry and in this defect of a lawful Ministery authorized Kings to make Laws and Orders for the Affairs of the Church till it were well established is surely this First They see that whereas the continual dealing of the Kings of Israel in the Affairs of the Church doth make now very strong against them the burthen whereof they shall in time well enough shake off if it may be obtained that it is indeed lawful for Kings to follow these holy examples howbeit no longer than during the case of necessity while the wickednesse and in respect thereof the unlawfulness of the Ministery doth continue Secondly They perceive right well that unlesse they should yield Authority unto Kings in case of such supposed necessity the Discipline they urge were clean excluded as long as the Clergy of England doth thereunto remain opposite To open therefore a door for her entrance there is no remedy but the Tenet must be this That now when the Ministery of England is universally wicked and in that respect hath lost all Authority and is become no lawful Ministery no such Ministery as hath the right which otherwise should belong unto them if they were vertuous and godly as their Adversaries are in this necessity the King may do somewhat for the Church that which we do imply in the name of Headship he may both have and exercise till they be entered which will disburthen and ease him of it till they come the King is licensed to hold that Power which we call Headship But what afterwards In a Church ordered that which the Supream Magistrate hath to do is to see that the Laws of God touching his Worship and touching all matters and orders of the Church be executed and duly observed to see that every Ecclesiastical Person do that Office whereunto he is appointed to punish those that fail in their Office In a word that which Allain himself acknowledgeth unto the Earthly power which God hath given him it doth belong to defend the Laws of the Church to cause them to be executed and to punish Rebels and Transgressors of the same on all sides therfore it is confest that to the King belongeth power of maintaining the Laws made for Church-Regiment and of causing them to be observed but Principality of Power in making them which is the thing we attribute unto Kings this both the one sort and the other do withstand Touching the Kings supereminent authority in commanding and in judging of Causes Ecclesiastical First to explain therein our meaning It hath been taken as if we did hold that Kings may prescribe what themselves think good to be done in the service of God how the Word shall be taught how the Sacraments administred that Kings may personally sit in the Consistory where the Bishops do hearing and determining what Causes soever do appertain unto the Church That Kings and Queens in their own proper Persons are by Judicial Sentence to decide the Questions which do rise about matters of Faith and Christian Religion That Kings may excommunicate Finally That Kings may do whatsoever is incident unto the Office and Duty of an Ecclesiastical Judge Which opinion because we account as absurd as they who have fathered the same upon us we do them to wit that this is our meaning and no otherwise There is not within this Realm an Ecclesiastical Officer that may by the Authority of his own place command universally throughout the Kings Dominions but they of this People whom one may command are to anothers commandement unsubject Only the Kings Royal Power is of so large compass that no man commanded by him according to the order of Law can plead himself to be without the bounds and limits of that Authority Isay according to order of Law because that with us the highest have thereunto so tyed themselves that otherwise than so they take not upon them to command any And that Kings should be in such sort Supream Commanders over all men we hold it requisite as well for the ordering of Spiritual as Civil Affairs in as much as without universal Authority in this kinde they should not be able when need is to do as vertuous Kings have done Josiah parposing to renew the House of the Lord assembled the Priests and Levites and when they were together gave them their charge saying Go out unto the Cities of Judah and gather of Israel money to repair the House of the Lord from year to year and haste the things But the Levites hastned not Therefore the King commanded Jehoida the Chief-priest and said unto him Why hast thou not required of the Levites to bring in out of Judah and Jerusalem the Tax of Moses the Servant of the Lord and of the Congregation of Israel for the Tabernacle of the Testimony For wicked Athalia and her Children brake up the House of the Lord God and all the things that were dedicated for the House of the Lord did they bestow upon Balaam Therefore the King commanded and they made a Chest and set it at the Gate of the House of the Lord without and they made a Proclamation through Judah and Jerusalem to bring unto the Lord the Tax of Moses the Servant of the Lord laid upon Israel in the Wilderness Could either he have done this or after him Ezekias the like concerning the celebration of the Passeover but that all sorts of men in all things did owe unto these their Soveraign Rulers the same obedience which sometimes Iosuah had them by vow and promise bound unto Whosoever shall rebel against thy Commandments and will not obey thy words in all thou commandest him let him be put to death only be strong and of a good courage Furthermore Judgement Ecclesiastical we say is
of causes of Judgement to be highest let thus much suffice as well for declaration of our own meaning as for defence of the truth therein The cause is not like when such Assemblies are gathered together by Suream Authority concerning other affairs of the Church and when they meet about the making of Ecclesiastical Laws or Statutes For in the one they are onely to advise in the other to decree The Persons which are of the one the King doth voluntarily assemble as being in respect of quality fit to consult withal them which are of the other he calleth by prescript of Law as having right to be thereunto called Finally the one are but themselves and their Sentence hath but the weight of their own Judgment the other represent the whole Clergy and their voyces are as much as if all did give personal verdict Now the question is Whether the Clergy alone so assembled ought to have the whole power of making Ecclesiastical Laws or else consent of the Laity may thereunto be made necessary and the King's assent so necessary that his sole denial may be of force to stay them from being Laws If they with whom we dispute were uniform strong and constant in that which they say we should not need to trouble our selves about their Persons to whom the power of making Laws for the Church belongs for they are sometime very vehement in contention that from the greatest thing unto the least about the Church all must needs be immediately from God And to this they apply the pattern of the antient Tabernacle which God delivered unto Moses and was therein so exact that there was not left as much as the least pin for the wit of man to devise in the framing of it To this they also apply that streight and severe charge which God soosten gave concerning his own Law Whatsoever I command you take heed ye do it Thou shalt put nothing thereto thou shalt take nothing from it Nothing whether it be great or small Yet sometimes bethinking themselves better they speak as acknowledging that it doth suffice to have received in such sort the principal things from God and that for other matters the Church had sufficient authority to make Laws whereupon they now have made it a question What Persons they are whose right it is to take order for the Churches affairs when the institution of any new thing therein is requisite Law may be requisite to be made either concerning things that are onely to be known and believed in or else touching that which is to be done by the Church of God The Law of Nature and the Law of God are sufficient for declaration in both what belongeth unto each man separately as his Soul is the Spouse of Christ yea so sufficient that they plainly and fully shew whatsoever God doth require by way of necessary introduction unto the state of everlasting bliss But as a man liveth joyned with others in common society and belongeth to the outward Politick Body of the Church albeit the same Law of Nature and Scripture have in this respect also made manifest the things that are of greatest necessity nevertheless by reason of new occasions still arising which the Church having care of Souls must take order for as need requireth hereby it cometh to pass that there is and ever will be so great use even of Human Laws and Ordinances deducted by way of discourse as a conclusion from the former Divine and Natural serving as Principals thereunto No man doubteth but that for matters of Action and Practice in the Affairs of God for manner in Divine Service for order in Ecclesiastical proceedings about the Regiment of the Church there may be oftentimes cause very urgent to have Laws made but the reason is not so plain wherefore Human laws should appoint men what to believe Wherefore in this we must note two things 1. That in matters of opinion the Law doth not make that to be truth which before was not as in matter of Action is causeth that to be a duty which was not before but manifesteth only and giveth men notice of that to be truth the contrary whereunto they ought not before to have believed 2. That opinions do cleave to the understanding and are in heat assented unto it is not in the power of any Human law to command them because to prescribe what men shall think belongeth only unto God Corde creditur ore fit confessio saith the Apostle As opinions are either fit or inconvenient to be professed so man's laws hath to determine of them It may for Publick unities sake require mens professed assent or prohibit their contradiction to special Articles wherein as there haply hath been Controversie what is true so the same were like to continue still not without grievous detriment unto a number of Souls except Law to remedy that evil should set down a certainty which no man afterwards is to gain-say Wherefore as in regard of Divine laws which the Church receiveth from God we may unto every man apply those words of wisdom in Solomon My Son keep thou thy Fathers Precepts Conserva Fili mi praecepta Patris tui even so concerning the Statutes and Ordinances which the Church it self makes we may add thereunto the words that follow Etut dimitt as legem Matris tuae And forsake thou not thy Mothers law It is a thing even undoubtedly natural that all free and Independent Societies should themselves make their own Laws and that this power should belong to the whole not to any certain part of a Politick body though haply some one part may have greater sway in that action than the rest which thing being generally fit and expedient in the making of all Laws we see no cause why to think otherwise in Laws concerning the service of God which in all well-order'd States and Common-wealths is the first thing that Law hath care to provide for When we speak of the right which naturally belongeth to a Common-wealth we speak of that which must needs belong to the Church of God For if the Common-wealth be Christian if the People which are of it do publickly embrace the true Religion this very thing doth make it the Church as hath been shewed So that unless the verity and purity of Religion do take from them which embrace it that power wherewith otherwise they are possessed look what authority as touching laws for Religion a Common-wealth hath simply it must of necessity being of the Christian Religion It will be therefore perhaps alledged that a part of the verity of Christian Religion is to hold the power of making Ecclesiastical Laws a thing appropriated unto the Clergy in their Synods and whatsoever is by their only voyces agreed upon it needeth no further approbation to give unto it the strength of a Law as may plainly appear by the Canons of that first most venerable Assembly where those things the Apostle and Iames had concluded
were afterwards published and imposed upon the Churches of the Gentiles abroad as Laws the Records thereof remaining still the Book of God for a testimony that the power of making Ecclesiastical Laws belongeth to the Successors of the Apostles the Bishops and Prelates of the Church of God To this we answer That the Councel of Ierusalem is no Argument for the power of the Clergy to make Laws For first there hath not been sithence any Councel of like authority to that in Ierusalem Secondly The cause why that was of such authority came by a special accident Thirdly The reason why other Councels being not like unto that in nature the Clergy in them should have no power to make Laws by themselves alone is in truth so forcible that except some Commandment of God to the contrary can be shewed it ought notwithstanding the foresaid example to prevail The Decrees of the Councel of Ierusalem were not as the Canons of other Ecclesiastical Assemblies Human but very Divine Ordinances for which cause the Churches were farr and wide commanded every where to see them kept no otherwise than if Christ himself had personally on Earth been the Author of them The cause why that Council was of so great Authority and credit above all others which have been sithence is expressed in those words of principal observation Unto the Holy Ghost and to us it hath seemed good which form of speech though other Councels have likewise used yet neither could they themselves mean nor may we so understand them as if both were in equal sort assisted with the power of the Holy Ghost but the latter had the favour of that general assistance and presence which Christ doth promise unto all his according to the quality of their several Estates and Callings the former the grace of special miraculous rare and extraordinary illumination in relation whereunto the Apostle comparing the Old Testament and the New together termeth the one a Testament of the Letter for that God delivered it written in stone the other a Testament of the Spirit because God imprinted it in the hearts and declared it by the tongues of his chosen Apostles through the power of the Holy Ghost feigning both their conceits and speeches in most Divine and incomprehensible manner Wherefore in as much as the Council of Ierusalem did chance to consist of men so enlightened it had authority greater than were meet for any other Council besides to challenge wherein such kinde of Persons are as now the state of the Church doth stand Kings being not then that which now they are and the Clergy not now that which then they were Till it be proved that some special Law of Christ hath for ever annexed unto the Clergy alone the power to make Ecclesiastical laws we are to hold it a thing most consonant with equity and reason that no Ecclesiastical laws be made in a Christian Common-wealth without consent as well of the Laity as of the Clergy but least of all without consent of the highest Power For of this thing no man doubteth namely that in all Societies Companies and Corporations what severally each shall be bound unto it must be with all their assents ratified Against all equity it were that a man should suffer detriment at the hands of men for not observing that which he never did either by himself or by others mediately or immediately agree unto Much more than a King should constrain all others no the strict observation of any such Human Ordinance as passeth without his own approbation In this Case therefore especially that vulgar Axiom is of force Quod omnes tangit ab omnibus tractari approbari debet Whereupon Pope Nicolas although otherwise not admitting Lay-persons no not Emperors themselves to be present as Synods doth notwithstanding seem to allow of their presence when matters of Faith are determined whereunto all men must stand bound Ubinam legistis Imperatores Antecessores vestros Synodalibus Conventibus interfuisse nisi forsitan in quibus de Fide tractatum est quae non solum ad Clericos verum etiam ad Laicos omnes pertinet Christianos A Law be it Civil or Ecclesiastical is a Publick Obligation wherein seeing that the whole standeth charged no reason it should pass without his privity and will whom principally the whole doth depend upon Sicut Laici jurisdictionem Clericorum perturbare ita Clerici jurisdictionem Laicorum non debent minuere saith Innocentius Extra de judic novit As the Laity should not hinder the Clergy's jurisdiction so neither is it reason that the Laity's right should be abridged by the Clergy saith Pope Innocent But were it so that the Clergy alone might give Laws unto all the rest forasmuch as every Estate doth desire to inlarge the bounds of their own Liberties is it not easie to see how injurious this might prove to men of other conditions Peace and Justice are maintained by preserving unto every Order their Rights and by keeping all Estates as it were in an even ballance which thing is no way better done than if the King their common Parent whose care is presumed to extend most indifferently over all do bear the chiefest sway in the making Laws which All must be ordered by Wherefore of them which in this point attribute most to the Clergy I would demand What evidence there is whereby it may clearly be shewed that in antient Kingdoms Christian any Canon devised by the Clergy alone in their Synods whether Provincial National or General hath by mere force of their Agreement taken place as a Law making all men constrainable to be obedient thereunto without any other approbation from the King before or afterwards required in that behalf But what speak we of antient Kingdoms when at this day even the Papacy it self the very Tridentine Council hath not every where as yet obtained to have in all points the strength of Ecclesiastical Laws did not Philip King of Spain publishing that Council in the Low Countries adde thereunto an express clause of special provision that the same should in no wise prejudice hurt or diminish any kinde of Priviledge which the King or his Vassals a fore-time had enjoyed touching either possessory Judgements of Ecclesiastical Livings or concerning nominations thereunto or belonging to whatsoever right they had else in such Affairs If therefore the Kings exception taken against some part of the Canons contained in that Council were a sufficient barr to make them of none effect within his Territories it followeth that the like exception against any other part had been also of like efficacy and so consequently that no part therof had obtained the strength of a Law if he which excepted against a part had so done against the whole as what reason was there but that the same Authority which limited might quite and clean have refused that Council who so alloweth the said Act of the Catholick Kings for good and
they answer it By the sixth and the fourteenth of the Acts say they it doth appear that the people had the chiefest power of chusing Howbeit that as unto me it seemeth was dine upon special cause which doth not so much concern us neither ought it to be drawn unto the ordinary and perpetual form of governing the Church For as in establishing Common-weals not only if they be popular but even being such as are ordered by the power of a few the chiefest or as by the sole Authority of one till the same he established the whole sway is in the Peoples hands who voluntarily appoint those Magistrates by whose Authority they may be governed so that afterward not the multitude it self but those Magistrates which were chosen by the multitude have the ordering of Publick Affairs After the self-same manner is fared in establishing also the Church When there was not as yet any placed over the People all Authority was in them all but when they all had chosen certain to whom the Regiment of the Church was committed this power is not now any longer in the hands of the whole multitude but wholly in theirs who are appointed Guides of the Church Besides in the choyce of Deacons there was also another special cause wherefore the whole Church as that time should chuse them For inasmuch as the Grecians murmured against the Hebrews and complained that in the duly distribution which was made for relief of the poor they were not indifferently respected nor such regard had of their Widows as was meet this made it necessary that they all should have to deal in the choyce of those unto whom that care was afterwards to be committed to the end that all occasion of jealousies and complaints might be removed Wherefore that which was done by the People for certain Causes before the Church was sully settled may not be drawn out and applyed unto a constant and perpetual form of ordering the Church Let them cast the Discipline of the Church of England into the same scales where they weigh their own let them give us the same measure which here they take and our strifes shall soon be brought to a quiet end When they urge the Apostles as Precedents when they condemn us of Tyranny because we do not in making Ministers the same which the Apostles did when they plead That with us one alone doth ordain and that our Ordinations are without the Peoples knowledge contrary to that example which the blessed Apostles gave We do not request at their hands allowance as much as of one word we speak in our own defence if that which we speak be of our own but that which themselves speak they must be content to listen unto To exempt themselves from being over-farr prest with the Apostles example they can answer That which was done by the People once upon special Causes when the Church was not yet established is not to be made a rule for the constant and continual ordering of the Church In defence of their own Election although they do not therein depend on the People so much as the Apostles in the choyce of Deacons they think it a very sufficient Apology that there were special considerations why Deacons at that time should be chosen by the whole Church but not so now In excuse of dissimilitudes between their own and the Apostles Discipline they are contented to use this Answer That many things were done in the Apostles times before the settling of the Church which afterward the Church was not tyed to observe For countenance of their own proceedings wherein their Governors do more than the Apostles and their People less than under the Apostles the first Churches are found to have done at the making of Ecclesiastical Officers they deem it a marvellous reasonable kinde of Pleading to say That even as in Common-wealt when the multitude have once chosen many or one to rule over them the right which was at the first in the whole body of the People is now derived into those many or that one which it so chosen and that this being done it is not the whole multitude to whom the administration of such Publick affairs any longer appertaineth but that which they did their Rulers may now do lawfully without them After the self-same manner it slandeth with the Church also How easie and plain might we make our defence how clear and allowable even unto them it we could but obtain of them to admit the same things consonant unto equity in our mouths which they require to be so taken from their own If that which is truth being uttered in maintenance of Scotland and Geneva do not cease to be truth when the Church of England once alledgeth it this great crime of Tyranny wherewith we are charged hath a plain and an easie defence Yea But we do not at all aske the Peoples approbation which they do whereby they shew themselves more indifferent and more free from taking away the Peoples right Indeed when their Lay-Elders have chosen whom they think good the Peoples consent thereunto is asked and if they give their approbation the thing standeth warranted for sound and good But if not is the former choyce overthrown No but the People is to yield to reason and if they which have made the choyce do so like the Poeples reason as to reverse their own deed at the hearing of it then a new election to be made otherwise the former to stand notwithstanding the Peoples negative and dislike What is this else but to deal with the People as those Nurses do with Infants whose mouths they besmear with the backside of the spoon as though they had fed them when they themselves devour the food They cry in the ears of the People that all mens consent should be had unto that which concerns all they make the People believe we wrong them and deprive them of their right in making Ministers whereas with us the People have commonly farr more sway and force then with them For inasmuch as there are but two main things observed in every Ecclesiastical function Power to exercise the duty it self and some charge of People whereon to exercise the same the former of these is received at the hands of the whole visible Catholick Church For it is not any one particular multitude that can give power the force whereof may reach farr and wide indefinitely as the power of Order doth which whoso hath once received there is no action which belongeth thereunto but he may exercise effectually the same in any part of the World without iterated Ordination They whom the whole Church hath from the beginning used as her Agents in conferring this power are not either one or moâ— of the Laity and therefore it hath not been heard of that ever any such were allowed to ordain Ministers Onely Persons Ecclesiastical and they in place of Calling Superiours both unto Deacons and unto Presbyters only such Persons